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Archive: IAB-Veranstaltungen

We investigate the long-run effects of government surveillance on civic capital and economic performance, studying the case of the Stasi in East Germany. Exploiting regional variation in the number of spies and administrative features of the system, we combine a border discontinuity design with an instrumental variables approach to estimate the long-term, post-reunification effect of government surveillance. We find that a larger spying density led to persistently lower levels of interpersonal and institutional trust in post-reunification Germany. We also find substantial and long-lasting economic effects of Stasi surveillance, resulting in lower income, higher exposure to unemployment and lower self-employment.

In recent decades, women’s labor market participation in the Netherlands and other Western European countries has dramatically increased. However, earnings of men and women still show substantial gaps around childbirth (Budig & England, 2001; Kleven, Landais, Posch, Steinhauer, & Zweimüller, 2019). t an early age, childbirth might be even more crucial to the emergence of inequalities (Chevalier & Viitanen, 2003; Gibb, Fergusson, Horwood, & Boden, 2015). To understand this process, we study young women’s education and employment trajectories around first childbirths. We observe monthly activities up to two years before and five years after. In line with previous research (Vlasblom & Schippers, 2006), we find substantial path dependence of pre to post birth trajectories. In a next step, we aim to explain this path dependence by means of human capital and social capital theories.

There is ample evidence from different research disciplines that locational factors such as employment opportunities or the availability of amenities and facilities are a powerful predictor of settlement behaviour. Recent research suggests that citizens’ mean personality traits might be an additional predictor of where young people settle themselves.

We therefore explore
(1) to what extent recent graduates in the Netherlands are geographically clustered with respect to five different personality traits,
(2) whether or not the geographical clustering is intensified after graduation
(3) how regional characteristics are related to personality traits, and
(4) to what extent personality traits play a role in graduates’ location choice.

Our results reveal a distinct geographical clustering of personality traits between the North and South of the Netherlands. We also show that this geographical clustering becomes more blurred as respondents age. The results furthermore show robust associations between personality traits and several regional demographic, health, political and physical outcomes. In addition to this, we show that personality traits play a role in graduates’ location choices. The impact of economic factors seem to be larger in determining location choice than the impact of personality traits in shaping location choice.

In many countries, important thresholds in examinations act as a gateway to higher levels of education and/or good employment prospects. This paper examines the consequences of just failing a key high stakes national examination in English taken at the end of compulsory schooling in England. It uses unique administrative data, including key information on both initial and regraded exam marks, to show that students of the same ability have significantly different educational trajectories depending on whether or not they just pass or fail this exam. Three years later, students who just fail to achieve the required threshold have a lower probability of entering an upper-secondary high-level academic or vocational track and of starting tertiary education. Those who fail to pass the threshold are also more likely to drop out of education by age 18, without some form of employment. The moderately high effects of just passing or failing to pass the threshold in this high stakes exam are therefore a source of educational inequality with high potential long-term consequences for those affected.

We present the first evidence on the role of occupational choices and acquired skills for migrant selection. Combining novel data from a representative Mexican task survey with rich individual-level worker data, we find that Mexican migrants to the United States have higher manual skills and lower cognitive skills than non-migrants. Results hold within narrowly defined region-industry-occupation cells and for all education levels. Consistent with a Roy/Borjas-type selection model, differential returns to occupational skills between the United States and Mexico explain the selection pattern. Occupational skills are more important to capture the economic motives for migration than previously used worker characteristics.

Almost one in four Dutch graduates states that they rather would have chosen a different field of study. Even when one has a job, regret of one’s study choice can reduce workers’ job satisfaction, productivity and wages. The analyses in this study rely on the assumption that youngsters choose a field of study partly based on expectations they have about future field-specific returns to education. We examine how the discrepancy between labour market conditions at the time of study choice and the actual labour market conditions faced upon labour market entry relates to regret of the field-of-study choice. Using data for Dutch secondary vocational graduates, we show that regret among male graduates is positively and significantly related to unfavourable changes in labour market conditions: a 1%-point higher discrepancy between the field-specific unemployment rate when choosing a study programme and the unemployment rate at labour market entry is associated with a 14%-point greater likelihood of reporting regret. Especially poorer employment prospects compared to expectations affect males’ regret. For females, we do not find such a relation. From a policy perspective, our findings suggest that mid-term labour market forecasts by field of study provide relevant information that potentially could improve educational choices.

Bayesianische Methoden sind sehr gut geeignet mit latenten Variablen als Struktur gebende Elemente in modellbasierten Clusterfahren umzugehen. Neben der vollständigen Erfassung der Schätzunsicherheit auch in kleinen Stichproben, erlauben die Bayesianischen Methoden unmittelbar Modellerweiterungen vorzunehmen, z.B. verallgemeinerte Korrelationsstrukturen und Clusterstratifizierung zu berücksichtigen. Die Implementierung der Schätzroutinen greift dabei intensiv auf Markov Chain Monte Carlo Methoden zurück. In Bezug auf die Modellspezifikation eröffnet der Bayesianische Modellrahmen die Möglichkeit der Modellmittelung als eine Möglichkeit optimale Vorhersagen unter Berücksichtigung von Modellunsicherheit zu generieren.

The ESDE 2018 review finds that labour market developments and social indicators remain favourable. Yet, major challenges lie ahead. geing will require much higher productivity growth in the future. t the same time, rapid restructuring, robotisation and digitalisation are fuelling productivity. They may, however, come at the cost of job losses, especially in manufacturing. Job displacements will affect mainly low-skilled and routine workers. On the other hand, investing in skills and qualifications can turn digitalisation into a net job creator by promoting innovation, boosting physical investment and accelerating productivity growth. However, in terms of skills the EU keeps lagging behind its sian competitors. Social background strongly affects overall educational outcomes as well as performance on the labour market.

Digitalisation and platform work are rising in the growing services’ sector and are changing the face of labour. While platform work currently makes only a small share of the EU's labour force, it is increasing fast and could bring about more atypical forms of work in the future, with lower attachment to public social security schemes. This development may challenge the EU's social security schemes. Higher government funding of the EU's social insurances may become inevitable.

We evaluate the short- and long-term effects for women of access to legal, subsidized abortion, by exploiting the Spanish legalization of abortion in 1985. We find robust evidence that the legalization led to an immediate decrease in the number of births, more pronounced for women aged 21 and younger. This effect was driven by provinces with a higher supply of abortion services. We also find that the affected cohorts of women were more likely to graduate from high school, less likely to marry young, less likely to divorce in the long-term, and reported higher life satisfaction as adults. We do not find significant effects on long-term labor market participation, employment, or earnings.We evaluate the short- and long-term effects for women of access to legal, subsidized abortion, by exploiting the Spanish legalization of abortion in 1985. We find robust evidence that the legalization led to an immediate decrease in the number of births, more pronounced for women aged 21 and younger. This effect was driven by provinces with a higher supply of abortion services. We also find that the affected cohorts of women were more likely to graduate from high school, less likely to marry young, less likely to divorce in the long-term, and reported higher life satisfaction as adults. We do not find significant effects on long-term labor market participation, employment, or earnings.

Im Vortrag werden die Effekte und Aneignungsformen aktivierender Sozialpolitik am Beispiel der Bedarfsorientierten Mindestsicherung in Österreich diskutiert. Grundlage hierfür ist eine umfassende qualitative Studie auf Basis der Rekonstruktion rechtlicher und politischer Programme sowie narrativer Interviews mit Mindestsicherungsempfänger_innen und Berater_innen in Österreich, die zwischen 2013 und 2018 durchgeführt wurde. „Aktivierung“ wird dabei als normative Vorgabe und zugleich institutionalisierte Strategie verstanden, die mit Hilfe unterschiedlicher Interventionen und Programme auf die Formierung von Einstellungen und Verhaltensmustern zur Herstellung marktgängiger Subjekte und ihrer „employability“ zielt. Die Frage, ob sich Subjekte gemäß dem sozialpolitischen Ziel der „employability“ aktivieren lassen, wird mit einer Typologie von Handlungsaktivierungen beantwortet, die zeigt, dass die untersuchten Subjekte sich zwar in den meisten Fällen „aktiv“ präsentieren, aber nicht durch die aktivierungspolitischen Maßnahmen im Sinne der „employability“ aktiviert werden. Die Überlegungen stehen im Spannungsfeld zwischen Armuts- und Arbeitslosigkeitsforschung, Subjektivierungs- und Gouvernementalitäts-Forschung.