Publications Based on SOEP Data: SOEPlit

A cross-cultural comparison of the ultrabrief mental health screeners PHQ-4 and SF-12 in Germany

The testing of measurement invariance (MI) across different cultural backgrounds for short screeners of mental health has been mostly neglected. Therefore, we examined MI in the most common mental health screeners worldwide used to assess the psychological indicators of health among migrants and refugees: the Short-Form-12 Health Survey (SF-12) for health-related quality of life and the Patient Health ...

Sustained Effects of Flexible Working Time Arrangements on Subjective Well-Being

The article addressed the impact of a transition to two flexible working time arrangements, employee- and employer-oriented, on subjective well-being (measured by job satisfaction and satisfaction with leisure time) from a longitudinal perspective. The study investigated which of three patterns of well-being, i.e., stability, recovery, or chronic strain/long-term improvement, are associated with these ...

Unemployment and Housework in Couples: Task-Specific Differences and Dynamics Over Time

Objective: The authors tested competing hypotheses about the effects of unemployment on couples' division of housework and total household production. Background: Gender-neutral and gender-based theories make opposing predictions on the reactions of couples. Few previous studies have tested these predictions using longitudinal data. This study extends research by examining how the effects of unemployment ...

Gert G. Wagner Recommends "Homo Ignorans: Deliberately Choosing Not to Know" by Ralph Hertwig and Christoph Engel

Are there gender differences in associations of effort–reward imbalance at work with self-reported doctor-diagnosed depression? Prospective evidence from the German Socio-Economic Panel

Purpose: Cohort studies established elevated risks of depression among employees experiencing psychosocial stress at work, defined by ‘job strain’ or ‘effort–reward imbalance’ (ERI). Yet, conflicting evidence exists on whether the strength of these associations varies by gender. We explore this question in a nationally representative sample of working women and men where work stress (ERI) was related ...

The German feed-in tariff revisited - an empirical investigation on its distributional effects

In the context of the German energy transition, the financial burdens associated with subsidies for renewable energies have increased substantially in recent years. These costs are passed on to consumers in the form of the EEG levy as a component of the electricity price. However, some households benefit from owning photovoltaic (PV) systems because they receive the corresponding feed-in tariffs. In ...

Migrant Fertility in Germany and the Eastern Enlargement of the EU

This paper uses data from the Migrant Samples of the German Socio-Economic Panel to study the fertility behaviour of women who migrated to Germany between 1990 and 2015. Special emphasis is placed on the large groups of migrants who have moved to Germany from Central and Eastern European (CEE) countries since the 1990s. We find that CEE migrants had higher first birth, but much lower second birth rates ...

The cost-of-illness for invasive meningococcal disease caused by serogroup B Neisseria meningitidis (MenB) in Germany

Introduction: Invasive meningococcal disease (IMD) is a severe disease mainly affecting infants and young children. The most common serogroup causing IMD in Germany is the serogroup type B Neisseria meningitidis (MenB). The aim of the present study is to estimate the economic burden of MenB-related IMD in Germany. Method: A bottom-up, model-based costing approach has been used to calculate the diagnose- ...

COVID-19 Is Not Affecting All Working People Equally

The corona pandemic and the political measures undertaken to contain it are changing the working conditions of many people in Germany. Based on data from the first tranche of a supplementary survey (SOEP-Cov) to the German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP), this study analyzes the effects of the corona crisis on Germany’s working population in 2019. In this paper, we investigate how severely people have ...

How do differing degrees of working-time autonomy and overtime affect worker well-being? A multilevel approach using data from the German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP)

Flextime, or Flexitime, leads to greater worker satisfaction and well-being, but evidence shows increased working-time autonomy also leads to a greater risk of burnout and overload. The aim of this study is to estimate the effects of working-time arrangements with differing levels of autonomy on job and leisure satisfaction as well as subjective health. It uses working excessive hours as the threshold ...