The paper reviews national and international experiences with different combinations of in-work benefits, subsidized employment, statutory minimum wages and implicit minimum wages defined by social assistance provisions. It calls for a cautious approach regarding the introduction of additional...

In most industrialized countries, more people than ever are having to cope with the burden of caring for elderly parents. This paper formulates a model to explain how parental care responsibilities and family structure interact children's mobility characteristics. A key insight we obtain is that...

Having faced high unemployment rates for more than a decade, the German government implemented a comprehensive set of labour market reforms during the period 2003-2005. This paper describes the economic and institutional context of the German labour market before and after these so-called Hartz...

Using a large linked employer-employee data set for Germany, we find that the existence of a works council is associated with a lower separation rate to employment, in particular for men and workers with low tenure. While works council monopoly effects show up in all specifications, clear voice...

The paper uses a new German employer survey on wage setting practices to analyze incidence and sources of nominal wage rigidity in services vs. manufacturing. We observe that wage freezes are significantly more frequent and wage cuts less frequent in services. Reasons preventing wage cuts...

This paper analyses job separations in Germany using data from the German Socio-Economic Panel spanning from 1984 to 2003. Based on detailed reasons for job separation and different SOEP samples, the paper attempts to establish the nature of job separations in Germany. It brings to light some...

Different models of protection against labor market risks are associated with diverging models of economic performance. Historically established institutional complementarities between labor market regulation, unemployment protection, and vocational training tend to mirror specific national...