SOEP Research: Inequality and Mobility

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

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

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 ...

Optimal Taxation under Different Concepts of Justness

A common assumption in the optimal taxation literature is that the social planner maximizes a welfarist social welfare function with weights decreasing with income. However, high transfer withdrawal rates in many countries imply very low weights for the working poor in practice. We reconcile this puzzle by generalizing the optimal taxation framework by Saez (2002) to allow for alternatives to welfarism. ...

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...

Income groups and types of employment in Germany since 1995

This report examines how income groups and forms of employment in Germany have changed in the past two decades. Since the mid-1990s, inequality in disposable household income in Germany has generally increased. This trend was in effect until 2005. While fewer people had disposable incomes in the median range, the proportion of the population at both tails of the income distribution increased. At the ...

"Regular employment continues to play important role": Five questions for Peter Krause and Christian Franz

Mr. Krause, you took a close look at income groups in Germany. What did you hope to accomplish? Peter Krause: We wanted to bring together two discussion threads in our study. One thread has to do with the long-term trend in inequality of household income distribution and the other, with changes in labor force participation. Until the mid-2000s, inequality in disposable household income increased and ...

Income Groups and Types of Employment in Germany since 1995

This report examines how income groups and forms of employment in Germany have changed in the past two decades. Since the mid-1990s, inequality in disposable household income in Germany has generally increased. This trend was in effect until 2005. While fewer people had disposable incomes in the median range, the proportion of the population at both tails of the income distribution increased. At the ...

Regular Employment Continues to Play Important Role: Interview with Peter Krause and Christian Franz

Longitudinal Wealth Data and Multiple Imputation: An Evaluation Study

Statistical analysis in surveys is generally facing missing data. In longitudinal studies for some missing values there might be past or future data points available. The question arises how to successfully transform this advantage into improvedimputation strategies. In a simulation study the authors compare six combinations of cross-sectional and longitudinal imputation strategies for German wealth ...

Comparing Wealth - Data Quality of the HFCS

The Household Finance and Consumption Survey (HFCS) provides information about house-hold wealth (real and financial assets as well as liabilities) from 15 Euro-countries around the year 2010 (first wave). The survey will be the central dataset in this topic in the future. However, several aspects point to potential methodological constraints regarding cross-country comparability. Therefore the aim ...