This paper analyzes the returns to training that was co-financed by the German voucher program Bildungsprämie. The estimation strategy compares outcomes of participants in voucher training with voucher recipients who intended to participate in training, but did not do so because of a random...

We investigate minimum wage spillovers by exploiting the first-time introduction of a minimum wage within a quasi-experiment in a context with an extraordinary large bite: the German roofing industry. We find positive wage spillovers for medium-skilled workers with wages just above the minimum...

If agents are exposed to continual competitive pressure, how does a short-term variation of the severity of the competition affect agents' performance? In a real-effort laboratory experiment, we study a one-time increase in incentives in a sequence of equally incentivized contests. Our results...

The paper investigates determinants of formal and non-formal continuous vocational training and its income effects among German selfemployed and employed workers in 1991/92. Participation in continuous formal training is more frequently observed with employed workers, whereas self-employed are...

This paper analyses the developments in the returns to education in West Germany for the period from 1984 to 1997. Based on simple Mincer-type wage equations, we estimate a return of about 8% for men and 10% for women, and these returns have remained remarkably stable over the period. On the...

Wir analysieren die Entwicklung der Bildungsrenditen in Westdeutschland in der Periode von 1984 bis 1997 auf der Basis der Humankapitaltheorie mit Daten des Sozio-Ökonomischen Panels. Die Schätzergebnisse zeigen, dass Frauen mit etwa 10% eine signifikant höhere durchschnittliche...

We study how beliefs about the automatability of workers' occupation affect labor-market expectations and willingness to participate in further training. In our representative online survey, respondents on average underestimate the automation risk of their occupation, especially those in...

One of the most important policy goals in industrialized countries is to increase the skill level of the labor force by life-long-learning strategies. In this paper our aim is to explain to what extent the variation in training investments is determined either by (observed and unobserved)...