In view of rising wage and income inequality, the introduction of a legal minimum wage has recently become an important policy issue in Germany. We analyze the distributional effects of a nationwide legal minimum wage of 7.50 € per hour on the basis of a microsimulation model which accounts...

We analyze the impact of changing employment patterns and pension reforms on the future level of public pensions across birth cohorts in Germany. The analysis is based on a rich dataset that combines household survey data from the German Socio-Economic Panel Study (SOEP) and process-produced...

Die Konsolidierung der Staatsfinanzen nach der gegenwärtigen Finanz- und Wirtschaftskrise wird eines der zentralen wirtschaftspolitischen Themen der nächsten Jahre sein: Die Regelungen zur 'Schuldenbremse' sehen für den Bundeshaushalt bis 2016 einen annähernd ausgeglichenen Haushalt vor, und...

We analyze the labor supply and income effects of a needs-based minimum benefit system ('Bedarfsorientierte Mindestsicherung') to be introduced in Austria by the end of this/beginning of next year. The aim of this reform is to reduce poverty as well as increasing employment rates of recipients...

Staatliche Instrumente zur Einkommenssicherung im Niedriglohnbereich durch 'Kombilohn-Modelle' existieren auch in Deutschland schon seit längerem und wurden im Zuge der jüngsten Arbeitsmarktreformen ausgeweitet. Aktuelle Reformvorschläge für Deutschland zielen zum einen auf die...

In diesem Beitrag werden die Beschäftigungswirkungen von Lohnsubventionen und eines Mindestlohnes für Deutschland analysiert. Studien zum Mindestlohn im Baugewerbe und Simulationen zu einem allgemeinen Mindestlohn weisen einhellig auf Beschäftigungsverluste durch einen gesetzlichen...

The idea of higher wealth taxes to finance the mounting public debt in the wake of the financial crises is gaining ground in several OECD countries. We evaluate the revenue and distributional effects of a one-time capital levy on personal net wealth that is currently on the German political...

Incentives to invest in higher education are affected by both the direct wage effect of human capital investments and the indirect wage effect resulting from lower unemployment risks and shorter spells in unemployment associated with higher educated. We analyse the returns to education in...

We exploit an exhaustive administrative dataset that includes the individual tax returns of all households in the top percentile of the income distribution in Germany to pin down the effective income taxation of households with very high incomes. Taking tax base erosion into account, we find...

This paper provides formulas for optimal top marginal tax rates when couples are taxed according to income splitting between spouses, consumption is taxed, and the skill distribution is unbounded. Optimal top marginal income tax rates are computed for Germany using a dataset that includes the...