IAB Research Project on the Quarterly Statistics of Vacancies on Behalf of the Federal Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs : First Interim Report

Abstract

"According to an administrative agreement between the Federal Ministry of Labour (BMAS) and the Federal Employment Agency (BA), this research project is intended to investigate if vacancies can serve as an early-stage indicator for the development of employment. For that purpose, the Institute for Employment Research (IAB) has been charged with various main research questions that are to be answered with data of the German Job Vacancy Survey (EGS). <br> For a first interim report, it has been agreed upon to illustrate the state of the analyses of the project and to outline first research results, as well as to present a review of the literature on the topic of vacancies. All this is provided by the report, which is structured as follows: First, we give an overview of the EGS, the data of which we use. The data on the development of employment originate from the ?A's administrative registers. Afterwards, the literature Part provides an overview over scientific publications on the topic of vacancies. The third Part presents first research results. Therein, we discuss the question if there is a connection between the development of vacancies and the development of employment. We demonstrate the progress of both figures graphically und discuss the results of correlation analyses. In this context, reference is already made to potentials and limits of the data. In conclusion, perspectives for further steps of analysis are summarized in a prospecting section. On the basis of our results, it can not yet be specified whether vacancies can serve as an early-stage indicator of employment. Our illustrations only partially show parallels between the development of vacancies and employment. Also, the correlation analyses confirm significant relationships only in few sectors of the economy." (Author's abstract, IAB-Doku) ((en))

Cite article

Kettner, A., Pausch, S. & Szameitat, J. (2009): IAB-Forschungsprojekt zur vierteljährlichen Statistik offener Stellen im Auftrag des Bundesministeriums für Arbeit und Soziales. Erster Zwischenbericht. Nürnberg, 26 p.