Working Papers

Seria wydawnicza WNE WORKING PAPERS prowadzona jest przez WNE UW od 2008 r. i jak dotąd opublikowano w niej ponad 400 prac.

Seria WNE Working Papers służy szybkiemu upowszechnianiu wyników badań prowadzonych na Wydziale Nauk Ekonomicznych UW. Publikowane tu teksty mają charakter wersji roboczych (pre-printów): mogą być uzupełniane lub poprawiane w miarę postępu prac nad tekstem i procesu wydawniczego. Prezentujemy aktualną wersję udostępnioną przez autorów, opatrzoną datą oraz identyfikatorami DOI/ISSN – co ułatwia jej cytowanie i śledzenie kolejnych iteracji. Każdy dokument zachowuje pełne prawa autorskie swoich twórców, a w przypadku późniejszych zmian, autorzy mogą w dowolnym momencie zamieścić zaktualizowany plik lub wskazać miejsce ostatecznego wydania.

Do serii WORKING PAPERS przyjmowane są artykuły pracowników naukowych WNE UW oraz publikacje z konferencji organizowanych na WNE UW. Artykuły powinny dotyczyć ekonomii, mieć charakter oryginalnych prac badawczych, nie być wcześniej publikowane. Przyjmowane są wyłącznie teksty w języku angielskim.

Prace prosimy przesyłać e-mailem na adres: *.x\eEBj#+8q~i}'%vVz|Q2@hMS]#[|xkHO0$[gwxdr$uqg!Lr#3q2q=@

Prosimy przesyłać dwa pliki:

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Przed przesłaniem tekstu prosimy zapoznać się z szczegółowymi wymogami edycyjnymi.

Redaktorem wydawniczym serii Working Papers jest dr Maciej Bukowski.

Ilość wyników 536

WP(36/2026)530. Work-from-Home as a Structural Bridge: How the Spread of Remote Work Shapes Maternal Employment in Europe

Autorzy: Grabowska Magdalena, Matysiak Anna, Kurowska Anna
The rapid diffusion of work-from-home (WFH) has fundamentally restructured working arrangements in Europe, yet its role as a structural driver of parental employment remains under-researched. Analyzing macro-level panel data across 15 European countr…

WP530. Work-from-Home as a Structural Bridge: How the Spread of Remote Work Shapes Maternal Employment in Europe

The rapid diffusion of work-from-home (WFH) has fundamentally restructured working arrangements in Europe, yet its role as a structural driver of parental employment remains under-researched. Analyzing macro-level panel data across 15 European countries (2006–2024) alongside micro-level maternal transitions, we examine WFH's impact on employment for parents of young children. We find that national WFH prevalence is positively and significantly associated with maternal employment, while no effects are observed for fathers or non-parents. A 10-percentage point increase in national WFH share increases maternal employment rates by 0.86 percentage points the following year and raises a mother’s probability of transitioning from non-employment to work by 4.7 percentage points. However, WFH primarily facilitates part-time employment, acting as a reconciliatory bridge rather than a catalyst for full-time integration. Ultimately, while remote work enhances labor market attachment, without broader structural changes to domestic labor divisions, it risks prioritizing work-family reconciliation over full career equality.


DOI: https://doi.org/10.33138/2957-0506.2026.36.530
Grabowska Magdalena, Matysiak Anna, Kurowska Anna
work-from-home maternal employment labor market transitions work-family reconciliation

WP(35/2026)529. When Work Moves Home: Fertility Responses to Working from Home in Europe

Autorzy: Osiewalska Beata, Matysiak Anna
This study examines the role of working from home (WFH) in shaping fertility across Austria, France, and Poland. While WFH can enhance flexibility and facilitate work–family reconciliation, it may also blur boundaries and intensify work demands…

WP529. When Work Moves Home: Fertility Responses to Working from Home in Europe

This study examines the role of working from home (WFH) in shaping fertility across Austria, France, and Poland. While WFH can enhance flexibility and facilitate work–family reconciliation, it may also blur boundaries and intensify work demands, with ambiguous implications for childbearing. Using longitudinal Labour Force Survey (2006–2023), we estimate hazard models of first and subsequent births, distinguishing women’s and men’s on-site work, occasional and usual WFH, self-employment, and non-employment, as well as their couple-level configurations. The association between WFH and fertility is strongly context-, gender-, and parity-specific. For first births, women’s WFH is positively associated with entry into parenthood in France and Austria, but negatively in Poland, particularly when combined with temporary employment. For subsequent births, women’s WFH is linked to higher birth risks in France and Austria, whereas in Poland, this pattern appears only when she works from home and he works on-site. Men’s WFH shows little association with fertility. These findings highlight that WFH operates as both a resource and a strain: supportive policies and secure employment can turn WFH into a facilitator of family formation, whereas their absence may transform it into a source of constraint and inequality.


DOI: https://doi.org/10.33138/2957-0506.2026.35.529
Osiewalska Beata, Matysiak Anna
work from home flexible work fertility couples Europe

WP(34/2026)528. Job Stressors, Self-Reported Stress, and Childbearing Decisions: A Longitudinal Study of Working Women in Germany

Autorzy: Luo Chen, Jarosz Ewa, Matysiak Anna
Occupational stressors are linked to workers' subjective stress and major life decisions, such as job change, but their role in fertility transitions is unclear. This study examines whether objective occupational stressors and self-reported stres…

WP528. Job Stressors, Self-Reported Stress, and Childbearing Decisions: A Longitudinal Study of Working Women in Germany

Occupational stressors are linked to workers' subjective stress and major life decisions, such as job change, but their role in fertility transitions is unclear. This study examines whether objective occupational stressors and self-reported stress jointly shape childbearing among employed women in Germany. We test two competing hypotheses: women either exit taxing jobs by redirecting resources to family life, or preserve occupational resources by delaying or foregoing childbirth. We combine occupation-level stressor measures from the German BIBB/BAuA Employment Survey with data on 4,205 women from the 2011–2021 German Family Panel (Pairfam). Mixed-effects logistic regression models are applied by parity and adjusted for confounders. Among mothers, high stressors and self-reported stress were linked to a higher likelihood of pregnancy, supporting the exit hypothesis. Among childless women, associations were weaker and limited to psychosocial stressors. The stress-fertility link depends on women's subjective stress appraisal and parity, not only on objective job characteristics.


DOI: https://doi.org/10.33138/2957-0506.2026.34.528
Luo Chen, Jarosz Ewa, Matysiak Anna
fertility work-life balance job exposure matrix self-reported stress

WP(33/2026)527. Does the messenger matter? Scenario credibility and information source in valuing health risk reductions from air pollution

Autorzy: Boros Anna, Bartczak Anna
Perceived realism of the policy scenario presented in stated preference (SP) valuation depends on trust in the scientific soundness of the projected policy outcomes (epistemic credibility) and in policymakers' capability to deliver them (implemen…

WP527. Does the messenger matter? Scenario credibility and information source in valuing health risk reductions from air pollution

Perceived realism of the policy scenario presented in stated preference (SP) valuation depends on trust in the scientific soundness of the projected policy outcomes (epistemic credibility) and in policymakers' capability to deliver them (implementation credibility). Using a discrete choice experiment (DCE) with 1,100 Polish urban residents, we examine how policy scenario credibility shapes preferences for air pollution mitigation reducing risks from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). We contrast domain experts and artificial intelligence (AI) with no-source control as information sources on policy outcome projections. We find that epistemic and implementation credibility are strongly correlated; thus, we treat credibility as a single variable affecting preferences. Using a hybrid mixed logit (HMXL) model, we demonstrate that higher perceived credibility increases programme support, lowers cost sensitivity, and thus elevates willingness to pay (WTP) for the programme and morbidity risk reduction. We find no evidence that the information source influences preferences or scenario credibility.


DOI: https://doi.org/10.33138/2957-0506.2026.33.527
Boros Anna, Bartczak Anna
air pollution artificial intelligence chronic obstructive pulmonary disease credibility discrete choice experiment information source

WP(32/2026)526. Same Constraints in Changing Times? A Machine-Learning Approach to Childbearing and Fertility Intentions in Poland during and after the COVID-19 Pandemic

Autorzy: Kurowska Anna, Grabowska Magdalena, Świtała Maciej, Osiewalska Beata
While studies highlight COVID-19's disruptive impact on fertility, whether pandemic-era childbearing predictors remain informative post-crisis is less clear. Using Polish Familydemic panel data from 2021–2024 (N = 1,925, aged 18–49), …

WP526. Same Constraints in Changing Times? A Machine-Learning Approach to Childbearing and Fertility Intentions in Poland during and after the COVID-19 Pandemic

While studies highlight COVID-19's disruptive impact on fertility, whether pandemic-era childbearing predictors remain informative post-crisis is less clear. Using Polish Familydemic panel data from 2021–2024 (N = 1,925, aged 18–49), we apply theory-guided machine learning to evaluate a broad set of individual, employment, partnership, and family characteristics. Because short-term fertility intentions prove most predictive of childbearing, we model both actual births and firm positive intentions using random forest. The pandemic-trained model retained strong post-pandemic predictive performance (AUC-ROC = 0.86), demonstrating that pandemic-era drivers remain informative. Childbearing and intentions shared 16 of their top 20 predictors, highlighting common relational, demographic, and work–family factors. Relationship satisfaction, work–life balance, and domestic work division were particularly prominent, whereas prolonged school and childcare closures lowered predicted probabilities for both outcomes among parents. Ultimately, post-pandemic fertility dynamics reflect persistent constraints embedded in everyday family and working lives.


DOI: https://doi.org/10.33138/2957-0506.2026.32.526
Kurowska Anna, Grabowska Magdalena, Świtała Maciej, Osiewalska Beata
childbearing fertility intentions COVID-19 pandemic machine learning relationship satisfaction childcare closures

WP(31/2026)525. Co-adaptation: From MARL Non-stationarity to the Dynamics of Economic Adjustment

Autorzy: Lisicki Jan, Kopczewski Tomasz
Economic agents adapt their behavior to experience generated by interactions with other market participants. When several agents update their behavioral rules simultaneously, these adaptation processes become interdependent. We refer to this mechanis…

WP525. Co-adaptation: From MARL Non-stationarity to the Dynamics of Economic Adjustment

Economic agents adapt their behavior to experience generated by interactions with other market participants. When several agents update their behavioral rules simultaneously, these adaptation processes become interdependent. We refer to this mechanism 
as co-adaptation. The paper develops a formal representation that separates the continuation of an agent's own rule updates from cross-agent effects on subsequent updates. In a two-agent system, mutual influence can increase the cumulative effect of an initial change and prolong the resulting adjustment process. A simple model of price adjustment between two firms shows how these effects depend on adjustment speed and the response to a competitor's price change. With more agents, interdependencies between adaptation processes form a directed network. This perspective links economic adjustment to multi-agent reinforcement learning, where learning by one agent changes the environment experienced by others, and clarifies when such non-stationarity is part of economic dynamics rather than only a computational difficulty.


DOI: https://doi.org/10.33138/2957-0506.2026.31.525
Lisicki Jan, Kopczewski Tomasz
economic adjustment multi-agent reinforcement learning adaptive learning agent-based computational economics co-adaptation

WP(30/2026)524. From Information to Communication: Generative Interaction in the Production of Knowledge

Autorzy: Kopczewski Tomasz, Lisicki Jan
Economic analysis of information explains how existing knowledge is distributed, revealed, and used, while the economics of innovation treats new ideas as outcomes of search and recombination. This paper examines a distinct role of communication in k…

WP524. From Information to Communication: Generative Interaction in the Production of Knowledge

Economic analysis of information explains how existing knowledge is distributed, revealed, and used, while the economics of innovation treats new ideas as outcomes of search and recombination. This paper examines a distinct role of communication in knowledge production: interaction can change the course of search itself. We define the mechanism as adaptive feedback, in which one participant responds to the current state of another participant's reasoning and thereby alters the directions subsequently explored. The resulting idea need not be contained in the feedback or previously possessed by either participant. In stronger cases, interaction can change the representation of the problem and make previously unavailable hypotheses accessible. The paper distinguishes this generative role of interaction from information transmission and access to others' knowledge. It argues that institutions shape knowledge production through both information structure and interaction structure, including the timing of interaction and the balance between independent search and mutual influence.


DOI: https://doi.org/10.33138/2957-0506.2026.30.524
Kopczewski Tomasz, Lisicki Jan
communication knowledge production generative interaction search innovation problem representation

WP(29/2026)523. From the Point to Chaos: The Evolution of the Concept of Equilibrium in Economic Theory

Autorzy: Kopczewski Tomasz, Lisicki Jan
This article reconsiders equilibrium as a representation of economic order. It separates five properties often treated together—existence, uniqueness, stability, convergence, and predictability—and shows that fixed-point results in genera…

WP523. From the Point to Chaos: The Evolution of the Concept of Equilibrium in Economic Theory

This article reconsiders equilibrium as a representation of economic order. It separates five properties often treated together—existence, uniqueness, stability, convergence, and predictability—and shows that fixed-point results in general equilibrium establish existence without guaranteeing the other four. When uniqueness, stability, convergence, or predictability fails, the relevant object of analysis may shift from a single point to an equilibrium-selection process, a regime, an adjustment path, or a distribution. The same distinction matters empirically because equilibrium is not directly observed but inferred from a maintained model and identification assumptions. We therefore distinguish two ideal-typical orientations: a solution-centred approach, which seeks an object that closes the model, and a temporal-statistical approach, which locates order in persistent patterns of dynamics and distributions. The article argues that the continued appeal of point-based equilibrium reflects its tractability and explanatory simplicity as well as its theoretical role.


DOI: https://doi.org/10.33138/2957-0506.2026.29.523
Kopczewski Tomasz, Lisicki Jan
equilibrium general equilibrium stability nonlinear dynamics chaos economic methodology

WP(28/2026)522. Intra-Household Relative Income and Happiness: The Role of Unpaid Work Division During COVID and Afterwards

Autorzy: Grabowska Magdalena
Rising female employment and earnings have transformed partners’ economic positions, while gender divisions in unpaid labor persist. The COVID-19 pandemic disrupted the organization of paid and unpaid work, opening a window to reassess these tw…

WP522. Intra-Household Relative Income and Happiness: The Role of Unpaid Work Division During COVID and Afterwards

Rising female employment and earnings have transformed partners’ economic positions, while gender divisions in unpaid labor persist. The COVID-19 pandemic disrupted the organization of paid and unpaid work, opening a window to reassess these two dimensions within couples. Using longitudinal panel data from Poland (2021–2024), this paper examines how relative income and the division of unpaid labor relate to both life satisfaction and partner satisfaction among partnered adults. Random-effects models reveal distinct gendered patterns. For men, these dynamics are associated primarily with global life satisfaction: men report higher life satisfaction when they out-earn their partners, but substantially lower life satisfaction when they are out-earned and primarily responsible for domestic work. For women, effects concentrate in partner satisfaction: women who out-earn their partners report lower partner satisfaction when they also perform most domestic labor. These patterns hold for both housework and childcare and are observed primarily in the post-pandemic period.


DOI: https://doi.org/10.33138/2957-0506.2026.28.522
Grabowska Magdalena
relative income unpaid labor division subjective well-being intra-couple income distribution Poland

WP(27/2026)521. What Happens Without Conservation? The Prospect of Heritage Loss in Contingent Valuation

Autorzy: Jusypenko Bartosz
Economic valuation of heritage conservation depends on what respondents expect to happen without the implementation of a proposed intervention, yet this no-program counterfactual is often left implicit. We examine whether explicitly directing respond…

WP521. What Happens Without Conservation? The Prospect of Heritage Loss in Contingent Valuation

Economic valuation of heritage conservation depends on what respondents expect to happen without the implementation of a proposed intervention, yet this no-program counterfactual is often left implicit. We examine whether explicitly directing respondents to consider potential heritage loss affects stated willingness to pay (WTP) for renovation of a building and whether the contribution of information about adaptive reuse depends on whether such loss enters the valuation decision. A contingent valuation survey of 452 adult residents living near Pückler Palace, a deteriorating historic building in Poland, used a 2 × 2 randomized design combining a loss-consideration prompt with information about a genuine proposal to adapt the renovated palace as the new premises of the Museum of Ceramics. WTP was elicited as the maximum mandatory one-off levy respondents would support within an advisory-referendum framework. Among respondents not assigned to the loss-prompt treatment, a post-valuation question identified spontaneous consideration of heritage loss. Two-part models separated the probability of positive WTP from the amount stated among positive responses. Respondents assigned to the loss-prompt treatment had approximately twice the odds of reporting positive WTP and stated 61% higher amounts among positive responses. Among unprompted respondents, spontaneous loss consideration—reported by 54%—was associated with 92% higher positive WTP. Reuse information appeared to contribute more when heritage loss was not otherwise considered. The findings show that common information about an asset’s current condition need not produce a common understanding of its expected future without the proposed intervention. Stated preference surveys should therefore specify this trajectory with sufficient clarity and credibility that respondents are evaluating a common underlying policy change.


DOI: https://doi.org/10.33138/2957-0506.2026.27.521
Jusypenko Bartosz
cultural heritage historic preservation adaptive reuse contingent valuation stated preferences prospect of loss