Risk attitudes have an impact on not only the decision to become an entrepreneur but also the survival and failure rates of entrepreneurs. Whereas recent research underpins the theoretical proposition of a positive correlation between risk attitudes and the decision to become an entrepreneur,...

Support schemes for unemployed persons aiming to become self-employed have been recently reformed several times. In 2003, the "start-up-subsidy" (Existenzgründungszuschuss) was added to the existing "bridging-allowance" (Überbrückungsgeld) and the two programs to-gether led to a strong...

This paper extends previous research about the determinants of reservation wages by analysing the effect of progressive income taxation on the ratio between reservation and net market wages. Based on micro data for Germany (SOEP) we show that joint income taxation in Germany which discriminates...

Standard job search theory assumes that unemployed individuals have perfect information about the effect of their search effort on the job offer arrival rate. In this paper, we present an alternative model which assumes instead that each individual has a subjective belief about the impact of his...

Turning unemployment into self-employment has become an increasingly important part of active labor market policies (ALMP) in many OECD countries. Germany is a good example where the spending on start-up subsidies for the unemployed accounted for nearly 17% of the total spending on ALMP in 2004....

When unemployed persons go into business, they often are characterized as necessity entrepreneurs, because push factors, namely their unemployment, likely prompted their decision. In contrast to this, business founders who have been previously employed represent opportunity entrepreneurs because...

The generosity of the Unemployment Insurance system (UI) plays a central role for the job search behavior of unemployed individuals. Standard search theory predicts that an increase in UI benefit generosity, either in terms of benefit duration or entitlement, has a negative impact on the job...

In some countries including Germany unemployed workers can increase their income during job search by taking up "marginal employment" up to a threshold without any deduction from their benefits. Marginal employment can be considered as a wage subsidy as it lowers labour costs for firms owing to...

In this paper we analyze the relationship between social networks and the job search behavior of unemployed individuals. It is believed that networks convey useful information in the job search process such that individuals with larger networks should experience a higher productivity of informal...

This paper systematically investigates whether different kinds of personality characteristics influence entrepreneurial development. On the basis of a large, representative household panel survey, we examine the extent to which the Big Five traits and further personality characteristics, which...