Panel Lebensqualität und Teilhabe - Feld- und Methodenbericht der Welle 4

Abstract

"The field and methodology report for wave 4 of the panel survey “Quality of Life and Social Participation” (Lebensqualität und Teilhabe) describes the study design, survey instruments, field implementation, field results, and data preparation for the final survey of the remaining 16i-panel. The aim of wave 4 is to measure the long-term effects of the “Participation in the Labour Market” (Teilhabe am Arbeitsmarkt) subsidy programme according to Article 16i Social Code II after the end of the subsidy period. The panel survey was conducted as part of the evaluation of the Participation Opportunities Act which was carried out by the IAB. The central objective of the Participation Opportunities Act is to improve the employability and social participation of long-term unemployed people who are distant from the labour market or of people who have been receiving means-tested unemployment benefits under the Social Code (SC) II for a long time and whose chances of integration into gainful employment are considered to be very low (Deutscher Bundestag 2019). The Participation Opportunities Act comprises two active labour market policy measures: “Integration of the long-term unemployed” (Eingliederung von Langzeitarbeitslosen) according to Article 16e SC II and the above mentioned “Participation in the labour market” (Article 16i SC II). Both instruments essentially consist of wage subsidies for employers and provide holistic on-the-job coaching for the participants to support their employment integration. The telephone panel survey aims to analyse the short-, medium-, and long-term effects of the subsidies on the employability and social participation of the participants. The survey design was based on a programme-specific sampling, which resulted in a dual-frame approach with two independent surveys—the 16e-panel and the 16i-panel. Using a treatment-control group approach, both the participants (treatment group) and non-participating means-tested unemployment benefit recipients (control group) were surveyed in the panel study. The study design includes three 16e-panel waves and four 16i-panel waves, in order to examine the short-term, medium-term, and long-term effects of the subsidy. The maximum subsidy duration is five years for subsidies according to Article 16i SC II, and two years for subsidies according to Article 16e SC II. Therefore, wave 3 was the final survey for the 16e-panel and wave 4 is the final survey for the 16i-panel. The contents of the questionnaire for respondents primarily cover social participation and employability as key target dimensions of the evaluation, as well as characteristics of the support provided, including coaching. In wave 4, most of these key content areas from the previous waves are surveyed again as part of the 16i-panel, in order to identify developments in these constructs and to strengthen the panel character of the study. In addition, the questionnaire covers aspects of the sustainability of the subsidy effects upon the expiry of the subsidy with respect to possible transitions from subsidized employment to regular employment in the labour market. All participants in the 16i-panel gave linkage consent in the recruitment wave, so that the survey data can also be linked to administrative data from the Statistics Department of the German Federal Employment Agency. This further increases the analytical potential of the “Quality of Life and Social Participation” panel. In the fourth wave of the survey, a total of 4,602 telephone interviews were conducted by the SOKO survey institute between January and June 2025. In order to achieve the targeted net case numbers, unbalanced cases were also surveyed. These are target persons who did not give a (complete) interview in all previous waves. This resulted in an additional 751 unbalanced cases, accounting for around 16.3 percent of the realized interviews. However, unbalanced cases have a much lower contact rate (by 53.4 percentage points) and an almost twice as high refusal rate as balanced cases, i.e., those target persons who participated in all survey waves. As a result, the response rates for balanced cases (77.6 %) and unbalanced cases (19.7 %) differ substantially with 57.9 percentage points. Across all cases, the response rate is 52.5 percent. The recruitment of control cases was more successful than that of the treatment cases, with a response rate of 54.0 percent compared to a response rate of 49.4 percent, respectively. An average of 4.1 telephone contact attempts were necessary to successfully conduct an interview. The average interview duration is 30 minutes, although there are significant differences between the respondent groups due to the modular structure of the questionnaire." (Author's abstract, IAB-Doku) ((en))

Cite article

Hülle, S., Bömmel, N., Kasrin, Z., Meß, A., Özerdogan, A., Schiele, M., Schneider, R., Schröder, C., Trappmann, M., Weik, J., Wenzig, C., Wolff, J., Zabel, C. & Zins, S. (2026): Panel Lebensqualität und Teilhabe - Feld- und Methodenbericht der Welle 4. (IAB-Forschungsbericht 05/2026), Nürnberg, 99 p. DOI:10.48720/IAB.FB.2605