Publications Based on SOEP Data: SOEPlit

Codebook for the $PEQUIV File 1984-2011: CNEF Variables with Extended Income Information for the SOEP

IT and Communication Technologies Dominate Adolescent Downtime

Today’s teenagers spend their free time very differently than they did 15 years ago: engagement with IT and communications technologies is now their most significant leisure activity. Representative statistics based on data from the Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP) longitudinal study indicate that Internet and computer-based recreation plays a major role for more than 95 percent of all 17-year-olds in Germany, ...

Model Event History of Car and License Availability: How Accessibility Shapes Acquisition and Disposal of Cars

Sound forecasts of car and driver’s license availability are crucial for accurate estimates of future mobility trends and the development of planning strategies. Often these forecasts ignore dynamic trends and spatial influences. Cross-sectional analysis reveals that in areas with good accessibility by alternative modes, many households live with no or only one car even if they can afford a vehicle. ...

Poverty and the Dynamics of Social Networks: An Analysis of German Panel Data

How do social relationships develop when people fall into poverty or suffer from poverty over a long period of time? While literature regarding poverty and social relationships exists, respective dynamics and causality questions remain unanswered. We use longitudinal German Socio-Economic Panel (GSOEP) data from 1992 to 2013 and analyse contact frequency, the size of social networks, as well as their ...

The role of psychological traits for the gender gap in full-time employment and wages: Evidence from Germany

This paper shows that differences in various non-cognitive traits, specifically the “big five”, positive and negative reciprocity, locus of control and risk aversion, contribute to gender inequalities in wages and employment. Using the 2004 and 2005 waves of the German Socio-Economic Panel, evidence from regression and decomposition techniques suggests that gender differences in psychological traits ...

The consequences of own and spousal disability on labor market outcomes and subjective well-being: Evidence from Germany

In this paper, I contrast the effects of individual and spousal disability on subjective wellbeing and labor supply using data on couples from the German Socio-Economic Panel for the years 1984 to 2006. I find that both men and women reduce their propensity to work when they or their partner become disabled. The effects of spousal disability are economically large. I find no evidence for hours and ...

On the Stability of Preferences: Repercussions of Entrepreneurship on Risk Attitudes

The majority of empirical studies makes use of the assumption of stable preferences in searching for a relationship between risk attitude and the decision to become and stay an entrepreneur. Yet empirical evidence on this relationship is limited. In this paper, we show that entry into entrepreneurship itself plays a decisive role in shaping risk preferences. We find that becoming self-employed is indeed ...

Entry into entrepreneurship, endogenous adaption of risk attitudes and entrepreneurial survival

Empirical studies use the assumption of stability in individual risk attitudes when searching for a relationship between attitude to risk and the decision to become and survive as an entrepreneur. We show that risk attitudes do not remain stable but face endogenous adaption when starting a new business. This adaption is associated with entrepreneurial survival. The results show that entrepreneurs with ...

On the simultaneity bias in the relationship between risk attitudes, entry into entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial survival

We consider the simultaneity bias when examining the effect of individual risk attitudes on entrepreneurship. We demonstrate that entry into self-employment is related to changes in risk attitudes. We further show that these changes are correlated with the probability to remain in entrepreneurship.

Evaluating Parametric Income Distribution Models