Winter term 2020/21

December 8, 2020: COVID-19 warning apps: support in the fight against the pandemic?

The four-part online discussion series "COVID-19, Economy and Finance" in the winter term 2020/21 started on December 8, 2020, with a panel on COVID-19 warning apps. When the German warning app was launched in June 2020, more than 20 countries worldwide already had warning apps in use. So far, the high expectations for the app have only been partially met in Germany. Prof. Dr. Alfred Benedikt Brendel (Chair of Intelligent Systems and Services), Prof. Dr. Martin Wiener (Chair of Business Engineering) and Prof. Dr. Susanne Strahringer (Chair of Information Systems in Industry and Trade) discussed why this is the case and what support COVID-19 warning apps can provide in the fight against the pandemic from the perspective of business informatics.

Short keynote presentations first provided insights into current research projects. The cross-national analysis by Prof. Brendel and colleagues at the University of Göttingen identifies four archetypes of tracing apps, which differ, among other things, in origin (governmental vs. private), license (open source vs. proprietary) and use (voluntary vs. mandatory). "At the core, there are two concepts facing each other: the app is only for tracking infection chains, or the data and functions are also used for other purposes, e.g., for a symptom check," Prof. Brendel points out. Prof. Wiener and his team, together with scientists from Saarland University, are researching the impact of algorithmic transparency on the acceptance and use of the COVID-19 warning app. "We are investigating, on the basis of large-scale online experiments, how different levels of transparency affect citizens' willingness to download and use the app," Prof. Wiener elaborates. The keynote presentations provided ample starting points for the subsequent discussion round moderated by Prof. Strahringer, which addressed, among other things, the extent to which an adapted communication strategy, functional or data protection adjustments could contribute to greater acceptance and use of the German COVID-19 app. Among those attending the event, an ad hoc survey revealed that 75% were already using it: an impressive adoption rate!

January 14, 2021: 60 minutes: COVID-19 Debt: A threat to companies and the state?

The event on January 14, 2021, was titled "COVID-19 Debt: A threat for companies and the state?". A little more than 100 listeners followed an exciting online discussion with proven economic experts: Andreas Aumüller from Creditreform Dresden, Prof. Dr. Thomas Günther, holder of the Chair of Management Accounting and Control and Prof. Dr. Joachim Ragnitz from the Dresden ifo Institute. The discussion was moderated by Prof. Dr. Christian Leßmann, holder of the Chair of Economics, esp. International Economics at the TU Dresden. 

Andreas Aumüller from Creditreform, a credit reporting agency, sees COVID-19 as a catalyst. The structural change in industries such as retail from stationary stores to online trade is taking place faster than expected. Above all, however, the effects are also very heterogeneous within the sectors. In the retail sector, there has been significant growth in sales in some areas, such as bicycles, while other areas have shrunk significantly as a result of the crisis. In all of these adjustment processes, it is the personality and qualifications of the individual entrepreneurs that are most important. Those who find creative solutions will be in a good position after the crisis.

Prof. Thomas Günther has examined the connection between sustainable corporate financing and corporate success. According to the study, COVID-19 is tearing away a veil that was already covering the financial situation of many companies before the crisis. Companies with sustainable financing therefore came through the crisis significantly better than comparable companies with a different financing structure.

Prof. Joachim Ragnitz brought in the economic perspective. Despite the large debts in absolute terms that the federal, state and local governments have taken on to counter the crisis, this does not pose a threat to the sustainability of public budgets. After all, interest rates are extremely low and repayment periods are very long in some cases. One of the exceptions is Saxony, where a short repayment period is required by the state constitution, which entails the risk that timely repayment is only possible if investments are scaled back. This in turn jeopardizes longer-term economic development.

January 21, 2021: 60 minutes: How COVID-19 is transforming business and the economy

The 60-minute discussion on January 21, 2021, focused on the consequences of the pandemic for companies and the economy.  From the perspective of three specialist areas - controlling, energy management and marketing - it was shown how COVID-19 is changing the economy and what COVID-19 can mean for the management of companies. The speakers were Prof. Dr. Thomas Günther and Dr. Michael Graßmann (Chair of Management Accounting and Control), Prof. Dr. Dominik Möst (Chair of Energy Economics) and Prof. Dr. Florian Siems (Chair of Marketing).  The discussion was moderated by Prof. Dr. Silke Geithner (EHS Dresden).

Prof. Dr. Günther and Dr. Graßmann spoke about the change in cost management at European and American airlines in times of the COVID-19 crisis. For this purpose, they examined the business phenomenon of cost remanence. This means that costs cannot be reduced again to the same extent, for example in times of crisis, as they were previously built up. The results of the study show that Lufthansa and Air-France/KLM, for example, were able to reduce their costs disproportionately in the wake of the significant drop in employment. This is an ability that Ryanair has exhibited for many years and demonstrated again during the COVID-19 crisis. The U.S. airlines studied, on the other hand, exhibit cost remanence in almost all the cost items examined, which could be largely attributable to government subsidies. In the U.S., the subsidies are linked to the condition of neither laying off employees nor discontinuing routes.

Prof. Dr. Möst looked at the consequences of COVID-19 from an energy industry perspective. He said COVID-19 had led to a system shock in 2020. CO2 emissions, for example, have fallen more sharply than at any time since the Second World War. Energy investments and demand for electricity have also fallen. Prof. Dr. Möst nevertheless fears a "rebound" in greenhouse gas emissions. In order to continue to reduce emissions, an incentive for "green" investments is just as necessary as an increasing CO2 price (e.g. in Germany with the Fuel Emissions Trading Act). The structural decline in global coal consumption is likely to be accelerated by COVID-19. A decline in oil consumption, on the other hand, is not in sight without further political measures. Finally, the further development of natural gas consumption is associated with uncertainties. In many regions, however, high growth can be considered probable.

Prof. Dr. Florian Siems derived a thesis for relationship marketing in times of COVID-19 from existing approaches to the "theory of excitation  transfer": Following initial experiments for interpersonal relationships, a first stimulus can amplify the effect of a second one without the person in question being aware of it. This effect has already been empirically confirmed in marketing as well: People who are exposed to stress, for example, judge service employees with whom they are satisfied more positively than if they were not exposed to stress - provided that the cause of the stress does not lie with the company itself. For the COVID-19 situation, which is associated with strain and stress for many people, this can be deduced as a thesis: The current situation is a great opportunity for companies to be perceived particularly positively if they behave positively toward customers. And a great risk if the customer is not satisfied with something, because this effect is also likely to be intensified by the crisis.

January 28, 2021: COVID-19 and the impact on inpatient and outpatient area and healthcare production

The German healthcare industry has always proved to be a macroeconomic stabilizer in crises. The panel discussion on January 28, 2021, explored the question of whether this also applies in the COVID-19 crisis, which on the one hand affects essential service centers, but on the other hand can also provide new impetus in healthcare production. Prof. Dr. Alexander Karmann (TU Dresden) moderated an exciting panel of experts who provided insights into the outpatient sector, the hospital sector and the healthcare sector as a whole. Speakers included Dr. Adam Pilny, Research Associate and Principal Investigator Clinic Investments at RWI Essen, Dr. Gunnar Dittrich, Head of Department at the Association of Statutory Health Insurance Physicians in Saxony, and Dr. Sandra Hofmann, Head of Research International Social Policy at WifOR Darmstadt.

Dr. Pilny's keynote speech focused on the analysis of the flat-rate payments made by the Federal Ministry of Health for maintaining beds for COVID-19 patients, which were initially paid uniformly, later differentiated according to hospital type. As the uniform allocation practice proved to be problematic - revenue increases for smaller hospitals, revenue losses for maximum care providers - the ministry replaced the practice of uniform flat rates by payment of differentiated flat rates.

Dr. Dittrich discussed structural adjustments to outpatient care (test practices; hospital-replacing measures in nursing homes; test centers). The extent to which COVID-19 is driving the digitization of practices was illustrated using the example of video consultations, which are primarily used for mental illnesses. The high acceptance values from the online survey among panel participants still seem a long way off for general practitioner treatment in Saxony.

Dr. Hofmann concluded by looking at the economy as a whole, asking whether the role of the healthcare industry to date still applies: on the one hand a growth engine (industrial production), on the other hand a stabilizer in times of crisis (supply). Obviously, the first COVID-19 wave had hit production and exports hard. But this time, growth in medical care was also down, and subsequently even negative, which correlates with surprisingly high short-time work figures in the health and social care sector. As an outlook, and encouragingly, there are signs of a return to the old growth path - nevertheless, a renaissance of the cost discussion in healthcare and the view of health as a cost factor could revive.

March 18, 2021: COVID-19 and the "V" on financial markets

The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic has led to drastic price losses on the financial markets. DAX30 or Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 40% in value from the end of February to the end of March 2020. The crash was followed by a V-shaped recovery into early 2021 and price records in many markets.

Critics see this extreme volatility as an indication of the irrationality of the financial markets. In the discussion on March 18, 2021, the panelists focused on the role of information and expectations. Among other things, they analyzed the management of expectations around the publication of the labor market figures in the U.S. and discussed the ECB's interventions to support the markets from a practical perspective.    

The panelists were Jürgen Klaus (Team Lead, Funding and Investor Relations, Derivatives and Market Intelligence, European Stability Mechanism), Dr. Tony Klein (Assistant Professor in Finance, Queen's Management School, Belfast) and Prof. Dr. Ostap Okhrin (TU Dresden, Institute of Transport and Economics, Chair of Econometrics and Statistics, esp. in the Transport Sector). The panel discussion was moderated by Prof. Dr. Stefan Eichler.