Publications Based on SOEP Data: SOEPlit

Earnings Dynamics and Inequality in EU, 1994-2001

This paper uses ECHP for 14 EU countries to explore the dynamic structure of individual earnings and the extent to which changes in cross-sectional earnings inequality reflect transitory or permanent components of individual lifecycle earnings variation. Increases in inequality reflect increases in permanent differentials in four countries and increases in both components in two. Decreases in inequality ...

Equalizing or Disequalizing Lifetime Earnings Differentials? Earnings Mobility in the EU: 1994-2001

Do EU citizens have an increased opportunity to improve their position in the distribution of lifetime earnings? To what extent does earnings mobility work to equalize/disequalize longerterm earnings relative to cross-sectional inequality and how does it differ across the EU? Our basic assumption is that mobility measured over a horizon of 8 years is a good proxy for lifetime mobility. We used the ...

Increased Opportunity to Move Up the Economic Ladder? Earnings Mobility in EU: 1994-2001

Do EU citizens have an increased opportunity to improve their position in the distribution of earnings over time? This question is answered by exploring short and long-term wage mobility for males across 14 EU countries between 1994 and 2001 using ECHP. Mobility is evaluated using rank measures which capture positional movements in the distribution of earnings. All countries recording an increase in ...

Policy, Institutional Factors and Earnings Mobility

This paper uses ECHP and OECD data for 14 EU countries to explore the role of labour market factors in explaining cross-national differences in the dynamic structure of earnings: in permanent inequality, transitory inequality and earnings mobility. Based on ECHP, minimum distance estimator is used to decompose earnings inequality into the permanent and transitory components and compute earnings mobility. ...

Welfare: The Cheapest Country. Review of "The Real Worlds of Welfare Capitalism" by Goodin, Robert E. et al.

Essays in Empirical Public Economics

This Dissertation is devoted to the empirical analysis of the consequences of government action. In particular, it investigates the distributional impact of fundamental tax reform and the welfare cost of bequest taxation. Further chapters assess the sustainability of public budgets in light of demographic change and the productivity impact of air pollution.

Older Babies - More Active Mothers? How Maternal Labor Supply Changes as the Child Grows

Female labor market activity is dependent on the presence and the age of a child, but how do the determinants develop in magnitude and significance with the child's age? Using German SOEP data from 1991 to 2006 for mothers with young children, the change in maternal labor supply when the child is one, two, and three years old is explicitly addressed. According to the tobit regression results for ...

Higher and Higher? Performance Pay and Wage Inequality in Germany

Performance pay is of growing importance to the wage structure as it applies to a rising share of employees. At the same time wage dispersion is growing continuously. This leads to the question of how the growing use of performance pay schemes is related to the increase in wage inequality? German SOEP data for the years 1984 to 2009 confirm the large increase in the application of performance pay schemes. ...

Unemployment and social involvement: Dependencies and mechanisms. Findings from the Socio-Economic Panel Study (SOEP) (Dissertation)

Dependencies and Mechanisms of Unemployment and Social Involvement: Findings from the Socio-Economic Panel Study (SOEP)

People’s involvement in social groups and networks constitutes a resource for societies and individuals. More specifically, involvement represents the basis upon which social integration takes place and provides access to material and non-material goods considered to be rewarding for individuals. Despite substantial research suggesting that unemployment triggers social exclusion and social isolation, ...