"As a reaction on high and persistent unemployment in Germany, the largest labour market reforms in post-war history were implemented between 2003 and 2005. We analyse the impact of the reform and its coincidence with an economic expansion on the efficiency of matching out of unemployment....

"We revisit the puzzling finding that labour market performance appears to deteriorate, as suggested by negative time trends in empirical matching functions. We investigate whether these trends simply arise from omitted variable bias. Concretely, we consider the omission of job seekers beyond...

"This article provides a result-oriented view on the current status of German active labor market policy evaluation. The literature shows that nearly all groups of instruments positively affect the labor market prospects of at least particular groups of participants. However, regarding the...

"Wage subsidies are a major instrument of active labor market policies in Germany. This paper analyses for West Germany, if tenure differs across individuals taking up a subsidized or unsubsidized job, respectively, during the second quarter of 2003. The study is based on process generated data...

"Between 2005 and 2007 the German government raised a per-capita amount of around 10.000 Euros for each transition out of unemployment benefit receipt into basic social care, to be paid by the unemployment insurance. The so called 'Aussteuerungsbetrag' set strong incentives that investments in...

"Die aktive Arbeitsmarktpolitik nach dem Sozialgesetzbuch III wird aus Mitteln des Europäischen Sozialfonds im Rahmen des so genannten ESF-BAProgramms in der Zeit von 2000 bis 2008 ergänzt. Das Programm setzt bei verschiedenen Lücken der gesetzlichen Arbeitsförderung an. Im Bereich der...

"This paper investigates how founders' experience and professional background affect the duration of periods of self-employment, and to what extent the duration is affected by a balanced skill set in particular. In this context, an occupational choice framework based on a competing risk setting...

"Unemployment insurance (UI) sanctions in the form of benefit reductions are intended to set disincentives for UI recipients to stay unemployed. Empirical evidence about the effects of UI sanctions in Germany is sparse. Using administrative data we investigate the effects of sanctions on the...

"Gegenstand des Beitrags sind durch die Bundesagentur für Arbeit (BA) finanzierte Maßnahmen zur Förderung der beruflichen Weiterbildung nach dem Dritten Sozialgesetzbuch (SGB III), die in den Jahren 2000 bis 2002 mit Mitteln des Europäischen Sozialfonds (ESF) ergänzt wurden. Mit dieser...

"In this paper we analyse the health effects of fixed-term contract status for men and women in West-Germany and Spain using panel data. This paper asks whether changes in the employment relationship, as a result of the liberalisation of employment law, have altered the positive health effects...