This paper is motivated by the idea that the enlargement of the European Union is only one part of an overall process, known as economic integration, which characterizes the involvement of European economies into the global division of labor. Therefore, the paper aims at providing a quantitative...

Using the European Community Household Panel, we investigate gender differences in training participation over the period 1994-1999. We focus on ?lifelong learning?, fixed-term contracts, part-time versus full-time work, public/private sector affiliation, educational attainment, and the...

If labour market policies aimed at people with disabilities are effective, we should observe no significant difference in labour market outcomes between disable and non-disable individuals. This paper examines the impact of disability status on labour market outcomes using matching methods...

We use a quantile regression framework to investigate the degree to which work-related training affects the location, scale and shape of the conditional wage distribution. Human capital theory suggests that the percentage returns to training investments will be the same across the conditional...

Data from 31 countries participating in the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) is used to estimate education production functions for reading literacy. The analysis suggests that the probability of finding statistically significant and correctly signed class size effects...

The effects of active labour market policies (ALMP) on individual employment chances and earnings are evaluated by nonparametric instrumental variables based on Swiss administrative data with detailed regional information. Using an exogenous variation in the participation probabilities across...

The publication of the OECD report on the PISA 2000 study induced a public outcry in Germany. On average, German students participating in this standardized test performed considerably below the OECD average and substantially worse than those of other European countries, like Finland or Ireland....

Using data from the British Household Panel Survey from 1991 to 1996, the authors investigate the impact of union coverage on work-related training and how the union-training link affects wages and wage growth for a sample of full-time men. Relative to uncovered workers, union-covered men are...

This paper investigates whether and to what extent employment policy measures (co-) financed by the European Social Fund in Germany meet their objective. Specifically, it is analyzed whether qualification programs for employed workers in the German state of Saxony were effective in terms of...

This paper investigates whether and to what extent immigrants in Germany are integrated into German society by utilizing a variety of qualitative information and subjective data collected in the 1999 wave of the German Socio-Economic Panel (GSOEP). To this end, leisure-time activities and...