Publications Based on SOEP Data: SOEPlit

Couples’ early career trajectories and later life housing consequences in Germany: Investigating cumulative disadvantages

Using data on couples from the German Socio-Economic Panel (1995–2018), this study investigates how couples’ early career trajectories affect housing outcomes in early adulthood and how this effect is mediated by couples’ joint cumulative income. We apply a life course perspective by identifying dynamic treatments consisting of couples’ consecutive employment statuses and examining their longer-term ...

The Endowment Effect in the General Population

We study the endowment effect and expectation-based reference points in the field leveraging the setup of the Socio-Economic Panel. Households receive a small item for taking part in the panel, and we randomly assign respondents either a towel or a notebook, which they can exchange at the end of the interview. We observe a trading rate of 32 percent, consistent with an endowment effect, but no relationship ...

Your Place in the World: Relative Income and Global Inequality

Although there is abundant evidence on individual preferences for policies that reduce national inequality, there is very little evidence on preferences for policies addressing global inequality. To investigate the latter, we conducted a two-year, face-to-face survey experiment on a representative sample of Germans. We measure how individuals form perceptions of their ranks in the national and global ...

Adding household surveys to the behavioral economics toolbox: insights from the SOEP Innovation Sample

Integrating economic experiments into household surveys provides unique possibilities. We introduce the German Socio-Economic Panel’s Innovation Sample (SOEP-IS), which offers researchers detailed panel data and the possibility to collect personalized experimental and survey data for free. We present the options that this provides and give examples illustrating these options.

Fundamentally Reforming the DI System: Evidence from German Notch Cohorts

We study a fundamental reform of the public Disability Insurance (DI) system in Germany. Effective 2001, cohorts born after 1960 are no longer eligible for “occupational DI.” Occupational DI (ODI) implies benefit eligibility when health shocks prevent employees from working in their previous occupation. For the affected “notch cohorts”, the new DI eligibility rules require work disability in any job. ...

Determinants of welfare benefit use of immigrant groups - longitudinal evidence from Germany

While recent literature in Germany has compared predictors of welfare use between EU and non-EU immigrants, refugees have yet to be added to the analysis. Using survey data of approximately 4,000 immigrants living in Germany, I examine the determinants of basic unemployment benefits receipt for intra-EU immigrants, refugees, and third country immigrants. In particular, I investigate how education affects ...

Child and adolescent refugees: Living situations among refugee families in Germany

Sexual Orientation, Workplace Authority and Occupational Segregation: Evidence from Germany

An extensive body of research has documented the relationship between sexual orientation and income, but only a few studies have examined the effects of sexual orientation on workplace authority. This article investigates the probability of lesbian, gay and bisexual (LGB) people having (high-level) workplace authority and the effects of occupational gender segregation. It analyses four waves of data ...

The health advantage of volunteering is larger for older and less healthy volunteers in Europe: a mega-analysis

There is a vast literature on the health benefits associated with volunteering for volunteers. Such health advantages are likely to vary across groups of volunteers with different characteristics. The current paper aims to examine the health advantages of volunteering for European volunteers and explore heterogeneity in the association between volunteering and health. We carry out a mega-analysis on ...

Re-Partnering and Single mothers' Mental Health and Life Satisfaction Trajectories

Single mothers are a particularly disadvantaged group in terms of their mental health and life satisfaction. While it is plausible that re-partnering could compensate for these disadvantages by providing social, emotional, and financial resources, the evidence is inconclusive. Using annual panel data from Germany (1984-2020) and the United Kingdom (1991-2020), this study examines the life satisfaction ...