Previous research into the correlates and determinants of non-response in longitudinal surveys has focused exclusively on why it is that respondents at one survey wave choose not to participate at future waves. This is very understandable if non-response is always an absorbing state, but in many...

We show that personality traits mediate the effect of income on Life Satisfaction. The effect is strong in the case of Neuroticism, which measures the sensitivity to threat and punishment, in both the British Household Panel Survey and the German Socioeconomic Panel. Neuroticism increases the...

Extending working life is an objective for many nations. However, the UK government has recently reported only modest improvement "compared to many nations". A comparison of European, Labour Force Surveys show that Germany has reversed early retirement much faster than the UK since 2003. This...

Studies of deprivation usually ignore mental illness. This paper uses household panel data from the USA, Australia, Britain and Germany to broaden the analysis. We ask first how many of those in the lowest levels of life-satisfaction suffer from unemployment, poverty, physical ill health, and...

While many previous studies on temporary work have found disadvantages for temporary workers as compared to workers with a permanent contract, this study compares temporary work to the alternative of unemployment. Specifically, this paper investigates the potential integrative power of taking up...

This study investigates how the duration of the work interruption and the labor market status of mothers upon their return affect the division of housework in couples after a birth. By observing several parental leave policy reforms in Britain and West-Germany, this research also explores how...

Understanding how having children influences the parents' subjective well-being ("happiness") has great potential to explain fertility behavior. We study parental happiness trajectories before and after the birth of a child using large British and German longitudinal data sets. We account for...

The Great Recession has increased concerns over the fairness of the distribution of wealth and income in many societies. Using data on eight advanced economies (Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Slovakia, Spain, the United Kingdom, and United States) between 2007 and 2010, I show how the Great...

In the last four decades, women have made major inroads into occupations previously dominated by men. This paper examines whether occupational feminization is accompanied by a decline in wages: Do workers suffer a wage penalty if they remain in, or move into, feminizing occupations? We analzye...