Publications Based on SOEP Data: SOEPlit

Labour Market Institutions and the Personal Distribution of Income in the OECD

A large literature has studied the impact of labour market institutions on wage inequality, but their effect on income inequality has received little attention. This paper argues that personal income inequality depends on the wage differential, the labour share and the unemployment rate. Labour market institutions affect income inequality through these three channels, and their overall effect is theoretically ...

Are changes in the dispersion of hours worked a cause of increased earnings inequality?

Earnings are the product of wages and hours of work; hence, the dispersion of hours can magnify or dampen a given distribution of wages. This paper examines how earnings inequality is affected by the dispersion of working hours using data for the USA, the UK, Germany, and France over the period 1989–2012. We find that hours dispersion can account for over a third of earnings inequality in some countries ...

Does Migration Empower Married Women?

Women's Earning Power and the 'Double Burden' of Market and Household Work

Inequality and Poverty across Generations in the European Union

This SDN studies the evolution of inequality across age groups leading up to and since the global financial crisis, as well as implications for fiscal and labor policies. Europe’s population is aging, child and youth poverty are rising, and income support systems are often better equipped to address old-age poverty than the challenges faced by poor children and/or unemployed youth today.

Cross-national differences in income mobility: Evidence from Canada, the Unites States and Germany

Globalisation, technological progress and changes in regulations and institutions – which impact on the rise of earnings inequality in OECD countries?

This paper examines the distributive impact of economic globalisation, technological progress and changes in labour market policies, regulations and institutions in OECD countries over the past quarter century, up to the Great Recession. It identifies the relevant pathways between macro-economic developments and earnings inequality among the whole working-age population by accounting for both changes ...

Child Poverty and Changes in Child Poverty in Rich Countries since 1990

Mass Media and Concerns about Immigration in Germany in the 21st Century: Individual-Level Evidence over 15 Years

Mass media has long been discussed as an essential determinant of the threat perceptions leading to anti-immigration attitudes. The field of empirical research on such media effects is still comparatively young, however, and lacks studies examining precise measures of the media environment an individual is likely to be actually exposed to. We employ a nuanced research design which analyses individual ...

Refugees Unwelcome? Changes in the Public Acceptance of Immigrants and Refugees in Germany in the Course of Europe’s ‘Immigration Crisis’

Based on an innovative design, combining a multi-factorial survey experiment with a longitudinal perspective, we examine changes in the public acceptance of immigrants in Germany from the beginning of the so-called ‘migration crisis’ to after the sexual assaults of New Year’s Eve (NYE) 2015/2016. In contrast to previous studies investigating similar research questions, our approach allows to differentiate ...