Publications Based on SOEP Data: SOEPlit

The Amenity Value of Climate to German Households

Public preferences for alternative electricity mixes in post-Fukushima Japan

Using representative household survey data from Japan after the Fukushima accident, we estimate peoples' willingness-to-pay (WTP) for renewable, nuclear, and fossil fuels in electricity generation. We rely on random parameter econometric techniques to capture various degrees of heterogeneity between the respondents, and use detailed regional information to assess how WTP varies with the distance ...

Cost Liability and Residential Space Heating Expenditures of Welfare Recipients in Germany

Why has inequality in Germany not risen further after 2005?

In this paper we explore the reasons for the trend reversal in the development of household market income inequality in Germany in the second half of the 2000s. We analyse to what extent the increasing relevance of capital income as well as the rising share of atypically employed persons have affected the development of income inequality over the last two decades. We use household data from the German ...

Insecure Alliances: Risk, Inequality, and Support for the Welfare State

Popular support for the welfare state varies greatly across nations and policy domains. We argue that these variations - vital to understanding the politics of the welfare state - reflect in part the degree to which economic disadvantage (low income) and economic insecurity (high risk) are correlated. When the disadvantaged and insecure are mostly one and the same, the base of popular support for the ...

Education, Economic Growth and Personal Income Inequality Across (Rich) Countries

Education, Economic Growth and Measured Income Inequality

The Causal Impact of Fear of Unemployment on Psychological Health

We analyze the effect of job insecurity on psychological health. We extend the group of people being affected to employees who have insecure jobs to account for a broader measure of the mental health consequences of potential unemployment. Using panel data with staff reductions in the company as an exogenous source of job insecurity, we find that an increase in fear of unemployment substantially decreases ...

Self-perceived job insecurity and the demand for medical rehabilitation: does fear of unemployment reduce health care utilization?

An inverse relationship between job insecurity and sickness absence has been established in the literature, which is explained by employees avoiding to send signals of both poor health and uncooperative behavior towards the employer. In this paper, we focus on whether the same mechanism applies to the demand for medical rehabilitation measures. This question has recently gained much interest in the ...

Workforce reduction, subjective job insecurity, and mental health

We examine the link between workforce reduction, subjective job insecurity, and mental health using individual level panel data for private-sector employees in Germany. We first estimate the effect of firm-level workforce reductions on mental health, finding a strong, negative, and statistically significant relationship. We then extensively examine the role of subjective job insecurity as mediating ...