Do economic recessions and high unemployment lead to more business start-ups or are people more likely to become self-employed in periods of economic prosperity? Our analysis for Germany reveals that the cyclical component of real GDP has a negative effect on start-up activities. Moreover, the...

Based on German micro census data, this report compares the incomes of self-employed with those of employees. The analysis distinguishes between soloself- employed and self-employed with further employees and shows that the median self-employed with employees earns significantly more than the...