"Almost twenty years after German reunification there are still huge income disparities between western and eastern regions in Germany. The main purpose of the paper is to show how social transfer payments reduce these inter-regional disparities. In a first step we examine inequalities in the...

"In this paper we show that firm characteristics have an influence on the success of employment subsidies e.g. wage subsidies and in-work benefits, as they can strengthen positive effects or mitigate negative effects. We consider firm characteristics as post treatment variables, which are...

"Using representative linked employer-employee data of the German Federal Employment Agency, this paper analyzes to which extent full-time employees who earned low wages (less than two-thirds of the median wage) in 1998/99 were able to earn higher wages in the following years, and which factors...

"Sprachkenntnisse in Deutsch und berufliche Abschlüsse sind wichtige Voraussetzungen für die wirtschaftliche und soziale Teilhabe von Personen mit Migrationshintergrund in Deutschland. Seit längerer Zeit gibt es daher spezifische Sprachförderangebote für unterschiedliche Zielgruppen. Mit...

"Die Situation von Personen mit Migrationshintergrund auf dem Ausbildungs- und Stellenmarkt zeigt, dass diese nach wie vor wesentlich stärker von Arbeitslosigkeit betroffen sind, in der Regel ein geringeres Einkommen und eine geringere berufliche Stellung als Deutsche haben. Neben den teilweise...

"This paper focuses on the question of whether improving the competence of new business founders by means of coaching and training programs enhances the duration of self-employment. In our analysis we focus on support activities that are provided in addition to a financial subsidy and which...

"In this paper we study the effect of small labor market entry cohorts on (un)employment in Western Germany. From a theoretical point of view, decreasing cohort sizes may on the one hand reduce unemployment due to 'inverse cohort crowding' or on the other hand increase unemployment if companies...

"Using administrative linked employer-employee data from Germany, this paper analyses the real wage growth and career patterns of full-time employed low-wage workers between 2001 and 2006. Multivariate models accounting for sample selection demonstrate the relevance of individual characteristics...

"This article examines if occupations contribute to social closure by their structural characteristics. For this purpose the four structural indicators occupational specificity, standardization by training regulation, voluntary certification by private educ-tional providers and representation by...

"The so-called 'One-Euro-Jobs' are an important workfare program for unemployed persons receiving benefits according to Germany's Social Code II ('Sozialgesetzbuch Zweites Buch'), aiming at needy benefit recipients who can not be integrated into regular employment by means of other active labor...