Over the last decades many OECD countries introduced parental leave regulations in order to counteract low and decreasing birth rates. In general, these regulations aim at making parenthood more attractive and more compatible with a working career, especially for women. The recent German...

This study analyzes the causal effect of an increase in the retirement age on health. We exploit a sizable cohort-specific pension reform for women using two complementary empirical approaches - a Regression Discontinuity Design and a Difference-in-Differences approach. The analysis is based on...

The rapid spread of COVID-19 forced policy-makers to swiftly find solutions to reduce infection rates and keep mortality as low as possible. Empirical analyses on the effectiveness of control measures are hereby of primary importance. School closures were among the earliest measures enacted by...

Early retirement options are usually targeted at employees at risk of not reaching their regular retirement age in employment. An important at‐risk group comprises employees who have worked in demanding jobs for many years. This group may be particularly negatively affected by the abolition of...

The COVID-19 pandemic has led to lifestyle changes across Europe with a likely impact on sleep quality. This investigation considers sleep quality in relation to the evolution of the COVID-19 pandemic in five European countries. Using panel regressions and keeping policy responses to COVID-19...

We contribute to the empirical literature on the effective incidence of corporate income taxation. We focus on the so-called direct incidence via the wage bargaining process. Building on the innovative framework of Arulampalam, Devereux and Maffini (2012), we analyze the importance of various...

Using a linked employer-employee data set on the German construction industry, we analyse the effects of the introduction of minimum wages in this sector on labour market dynamics. In doing so, we focus on accessions and separations, as well as the underlying labour market flows, at the...

This paper estimates the employment effects of industry-specific, collectively-bargained minimum wages in Germany for two occupations associated with the construction sector. I propose a truly exogenous control group in contrast to the control group design used in the literature. Further, a...

This paper analyses the causal effects of weaker dismissal protection on the incidence of long-term sickness ( six weeks). We exploit a German policy change, which shifted the threshold exempting small establishments from dismissal protection from five to ten workers. Using administrative data,...

Using a linked employer-employee data set on the German construction industry, we analyse the effects of the introduction of minimum wages in this sector on labour market dynamics. In doing so, we focus on accessions and separations, as well as the underlying labour market flows, at the...