Publications Based on SOEP Data: SOEPlit

The Effect of Local Crime on Well-Being: Evidence for Germany

This paper investigates the effect of local crime on well-being in Germany, using data from the German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP) and a novel data set constructed from official police crime statistics, covering both counties and urban districts for the time period between 1994 and 2012. We find that local area crime has a significantly negative impact on life satisfaction, makes residents worry more ...

Sowing the Wind and Reaping the Whirlwind? The Effect of Wind Turbines on Residential Well-Being

We investigate the effect of the physical presence of wind turbines on residential well-being in Germany, using panel data from the German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP) and a unique novel panel data set on more than 20,000 wind turbines for the time period between 2000 and 2012. Using a Geographical Information System (GIS), we calculate the proximity between households and the nearest wind turbine as ...

Does the Presence of Wind Turbines Have Negative Externalities for People in Their Surroundings? Evidence from Well-Being Data

Throughout the world, governments foster the deployment of wind power to mitigate negative externalities of conventional electricity generation, notably CO2 emissions. Wind turbines, however, are not free of externalities themselves, particularly interference with landscape aesthetics. We quantify these negative externalities using the life satisfaction approach. To this end, we combine household data ...

Measuring the Consistency of Cross-Sectional and Longitudinal Income Information in EU-SILC

The EU-wide survey “Statistics on Income and Living Conditions” (EU-SILC) is extremely important for international social science research and policy advice. It is therefore crucial to ensure that the data are of the highest quality and international comparability. This paper is aimed at identifying unexpected developments in income levels, income mobility, and inequality in the EU-SILC data between ...

Assimilation of Ethnic Germans and East German Migrants into the West German Labor Market (Diplomarbeit)

Changes in the Timing of First Birth in East Germany after Re-unification

Educational Attainment and First Births: East Germany before and after Unification

Employment Careers and the Timing of First Births in East Germany

When German unification was accompanied by a rapid decline in aggregate fertility rates, researchers particularly assigned high unemployment rates a dominant role for changes in fertility behavior. The aim of this paper is twofold. First, we investigate changes in the timing of first birth in East Germany after unification. Using data from the SOEP, we show that even after unification East Germans ...

Employment and Fertility - East Germany in the 1990s (Dissertation)

Timing of First Births in East Germany after Reunification

When German reunification was accompanied by a rapid decline in aggregate fertility rates, researchers particularly assigned high unemployment rates a dominant role for changes in fertility behavior. The aim of this paper is twofold. First, we investigate changes in the timing of first birth in East Germany after reunification. Using data from the GSOEP, we show that even after reunification East Germans ...