Benefit sanctions imposed on non-compliant welfare recipients are a new element in the German welfare system. In practice, the sanction policy and the application of sanctions vary considerably across the 439 welfare agencies. Based on combined administrative and survey data, these differences...

The 2005 reform of the German welfare system introduced two competing organizational models for welfare administration. In most districts, a centralized organization was established where local welfare agencies are bound to central directives. At the same time, 69 districts were allowed to opt...

We develop a tractable macroeconomic model with employment risk and labor market search in order evaluate the effects of labor market reform on unemployment, growth, and welfare. The model has a large number of risk-averse households who can invest in risk-free physical capital and risky human...

We analyze the effectiveness of public works programs (PWP, Arbeitsbeschaffungsmaßnahmen) in east Germany as measured by their effects on individual future reemployment probabilities in regular jobs. These are estimated by discrete hazard rate models on the basis of individual-level panel data....

We estimate the employment effects of training, intervention works (subsidised employment), and public works programmes in Poland. The analysis is based on retrospective monthly calendar information on the labour force state and active labour market programme (ALMP) participation between January...

We analyse Polish active labour market policy (ALMP) training programmes from a macroeconomic (regional) point of view. The effects of training programmes on the outflows from unemployment and the effects of all ALMP programmes on the outflows from employment (to identify displacement effects)...

Rising wage inequality in the U.S. and Britain (especially in the 1980s) and rising continental European unemployment (with rather stable wage inequality) have led to a popular view in the economics profession that these two phenomena are related to negative relative demand shocks against the...

This study re-estimates the employment effects of training programs for the unemployed using exogenous variation in participation caused by budget rules in Germany in the 1980s and early 1990s, resulting in the infamous "end-of-year spending". In addition to estimating complier effects with...

This paper analyzes the impact of job creation schemes (JCSs) on job search outcomes in the context of the turbulent East German labor market in the aftermath of the German reunification. High job destruction characterized the economic environment. JCSs were heavily used in order to cushion this...

Dieser Beitrag stellt ausgew ahlte Ergebnisse des vom Zentrum für Europäische Wirtschaftsforschung (ZEW) im Auftrag des IAB und des Ministeriums für Arbeit und Soziales Rheinland-Pfalz bearbeiteten Forschungsprojekts "Arbeitsplatzeffekte gemeinnütziger Arbeitnehmerüberlassungen in...