We show that in a New Keynesian model with household heterogeneity, fiscal policy can be a perfect substitute for monetary policy: three simple conditions for consumption taxes, labor taxes, and the government debt level are sufficient to induce the same consumption and labor supply of each household and, thus, the same allocation as interest rate policies. When monetary policy is constrained by a ...
After an economically tough start into the new millennium, Germany experienced an unprecedented employment boom after 2005 only stopped by the COVID-19 pandemic. Persistently high levels of inequality despite a booming labour market and drastically falling unemployment rates constituted a puzzle, suggesting either that the German job miracle mainly benefitted individuals in the mid- or high-income range ...
This research studies the stylized fact of a “gender gap” in that women tend to have lower financial literacy than men. Our data which samples middle-class people from Bangkok does not show a gender gap for those with at least minimum wage earnings. This result is not explained by men’s low financial literacy, nor by women’s high income and good education. Rather, country characteristics may influence ...
Objective: At work, people are confronted with clear behavioral expectations. In line with the Social Investment Principle, the beginning and ending of working life might thus promote changes in personality traits that are relevant at work (e.g., Conscientiousness). Method: Based on the data from the Socio- Economic Panel Study (SOEP), we examined nuanced differences of the Big Five personality traits ...
The demographic change poses numerous challenges to societies in developed countries. In particular, the increasing longevity and the related ageing of societies affect the organization and the financing of the welfare state. Therefore, most governments have introduced or are about to design reforms of the welfare state, most important of the pension system. At the same time the increasing...
In the project, calculations are to be carried out on the return on different forms of old-age provision for three types of individuals: low earners, average earners and high earners. A distinction is made between calculations for the statutory pension insurance (GRV) and for company pensions (BAV). The main aim is to show how different legal regulations in the GRV and BAV that will be effective...
The Green Guarantee Pension is designed to ensure that people who have worked the majority of their lives, brought up children, looked after other people or have acquired other rights under the statutory pension insurance (Gesetzliche Rentenversicherung) receive a pension in old age that is above the means-tested basic pension. The Guarantee Pension increases pension entitlements within the...
We conduct a stated preference experiment to analyze the effects of pension incentives, increasing retirement age, and provision of a partial retirement scheme on individuals’ preferences to work parttime and full-time beyond the early and legal retirement ages. We conduct the experiment in Germany, the Netherlands, South Korea, and the United States for an international comparative analysis.
In this project, we analyze and illustrate the link between pension levels and poverty risk in old age in two steps. First, using stylized calculations, we show how changing pension levels affect the distance between retirement benefits and basic means-tested social benefits (Grundsicherung im Alter). Second, we analyze the impact of changing pension levels on old-age poverty risk and...
The aim of the research project was to non-take-up of social assistance for the elderly. The analysis is based on the Socio-economic Panel (SOEP). Using a microsimulation model (STSM) developed at DIW Berlin, it was determined on the basis of survey data from the previous year (including income and property information, household context, living situation, health situation, household equipment)...