Publications Based on SOEP Data: SOEPlit

What Determines the Reservation Wages of Unemployed Workers? New Evidence from German Micro Data

Taxation and the Worlds of Welfare

Closing the Happiness Gap: The Decline of Gendered Parenthood Norms and the Increase in Parental Life Satisfaction

In recent decades, normative expectations for parenthood have changed for both men and women, fertility has declined, and work–family arrangements have become more egalitarian. Previous studies indicate that the transition to parenthood and work–family arrangements both influence life satisfaction and do so differently for men and women. Drawing on constructivism and utility maximization, we theorize ...

Motherhood, Employment, and Life Satisfaction: Trends in Germany Between 1984 and 2015

Objective This article analyzes trends in the relationships among motherhood, employment, and life satisfaction in Germany and regresses them on changing motherhood norms. Background Motherhood norms have changed in recent decades in Germany, and differences in labor force participation between mothers and women without children have decreased. We research whether differences in life satisfaction have ...

The Decline of the Middle Class: An International Perspective

Feminist Explanations for the Feminization of Poverty

Income guarantees and the equity-efficiency tradeoff

This paper examines the tradeoffs inherent in guaranteed income proposals. Its perspective is international, using the Luxembourg Income Study and asking whether economic efficiency suffers when governments make greater efforts to protect the poor. Using two different measures of productivity growth, we find no big tradeoff between equity and efficiency. That is, during those times and in those countries ...

Policies To Reduce Child Poverty: Child Allowances VS. Tax Exemptions For Children

Biased by Success and Failure: How Unemployment Shapes Stated Locus of Control

We test the stability of locus of control, a measure that has been attributed substantial explanatory power for economic outcomes since it depicts how much people believe in their ability to affect life outcomes. Using the German Socio-Economic Panel, we find that a job loss due to a plant closure has no long-lasting effect on locus of control. The common assumption of its stability is thus not rejected. ...

Precautionary savings by natives and immigrants in Germany

This article analyses the savings behaviour of natives and immigrants in Germany. It is argued that uncertainty about future income and legal status (in case of immigrants) is a key component in the determination of the level of precautionary savings. Using the German dataset, we exploit a natural experiment arising from a change in the nationality law in Germany to estimate the importance of precautionary ...