SOEP Research: Inequality and Mobility

Deindustrialisation and the Polarisation of Household Incomes: The Example of Urban Agglomerations in Germany

The tertiarisation, or perhaps more accurately, the deindustrialisation of the economy has left deep scars on cities. It is evident not only in the industrial wastelands and empty factory buildings, but also in the income and social structures of cities. Industrialisation, collective wage setting, and the welfare state led to a stark reduction in income differences over the course of the 20th century. ...

Pathways between Socioeconomic Status and Health: Does Health Selection or Social Causation Dominate in Europe?

Health differences which correspond to socioeconomic status (SES) can be attributed to three causal mechanisms: SES affects health (social causation), health affects SES (health selection), and common background factors influence both SES and health (indirect selection). Using retrospective survey data from 10 European countries (SHARELIFE, n = 20,227) and structural equation models in a cross-lagged ...

The Relation between Religiosity and Muslims' Social Integration: A Two-Wave Study of Recent Immigrants in Three European Countries

Does their degree of religiosity affect how successfully recent Muslim migrants integrate socially into the host society in terms of their social contacts with the majority population and their ethno-religious group? And/or do these co-ethnic and interethnic social contacts affect the religiosity of Muslim migrants over time? On the basis of a two-wave study among recent migrants in Germany, the Netherlands ...

Exploring the Possibilities and Boundaries of Survey Data for the Analysis of Wealth and Wealth Transfers

Ein eklatanter Mangel an Register- oder Steuerdaten zur Nutzung von Forschern in Deutschland führt zur Situation, dass Umfragedaten die einzig nutzbaren Anhaltspunkte zur Vermögensverteilung geben. Zwei der vier Forschungsbeiträge dieser Dissertation beschäftigen sich mit der Frage, wie zum einen die Qualität der Umfragedaten verbessert werden kann. Zwei weitere Beiträge erörtern die Möglichkeiten ...

The Short-Term Distributional Effects of the German Minimum Wage Reform

This study quantifies the short-term distributional effects of the new statutory minimum wage in Germany. Using detailed survey data (German Socio-Economic Panel), we assess changes in the distributions of hourly wages, contractual and actual working hours, and monthly earnings. Our descriptive results indicate growth at the bottom of the hourly wage distribution in the post-reform year, but also considerable ...

The Short-Run Employment Effects of the German Minimum Wage Reform

We assess the short-term employment effects of the introduction of a national statutoryminimum wage in Germany in 2015. For this purpose, we exploit variation in the regionaltreatment intensity, assuming that the stronger a minimum wage “bites” into the regionalwage distribution, the stronger the regional labour market will be affected. In contrastto previous studies, we draw upon detailed individual ...

The Rising Longevity Gap by Lifetime Earnings: Distributional Implications for the Pension System

This study uses German social security records to provide novel evidence about the heterogeneity in life expectancy by lifetime earnings and, additionally, documents the distributional implications of this earnings-related heterogeneity. We find a strong association between lifetime earnings and life expectancy at age 65 and show that the longevity gap is increasing across cohorts. For West German ...

Integrating Research Infrastructure for European expertise on Inclusive Growth from data to policy (InGRID-2)

Referring to the increasingly challenging EU2020-ambitions of Inclusive Growth, the objectives of the InGRID-2 project are to advance the integration and innovation of distributed social sciences research infrastructures (RI) on ‘poverty, living conditions and social policies’ as well as ‘working conditions, vulnerability and labour policies’. InGRID-2 will extend transnational on-site and...

Development of Top Incomes in Germany since 2001

Real estate price polarization projected to increase until 2030 in Germany

Demographic projections for Germany indicate a drop in the population of many regions by 2030. This is likely to have an impact on the real estate market. Our report presents the result of a model calculation of asking prices for residential real estate in Germany up to 2030 based on market data from empirica-systeme GmbH and a population projection from the Bertelsmann Foundation. Depending on the ...