We re-examine the claim that the income effect on happiness is downward biased because higher income demands more work effort. We find no evidence of an underestimation because the impact of working hours on happiness is rather small and hill-shaped.

The social norm of unemployment suggests that aggregate unemployment reduces the well-being of the employed, but has a far smaller effect on the unemployed. We use German panel data to reproduce this standard result, but then suggest that the appropriate distinction may not be between employment...

This paper investigates the relationship between the subjective well-being of both the employed and unemployed and regional unemployment rates. While both employed and unemployed men suffer from regional unemployment, unemployed men are significantly less negatively affected. This is consistent...

We study the subsidization of extra jobs in a general equilibrium framework. While the previous literature focuses on symmetric marginal employment subsidies where firms are rewarded when they increase employment but punished when they reduce their workforce, we consider an asymmetric scheme...

This paper analyzes the impact of a statutory minimum wage on employment, wage inequality, public expenditures, and aggregate income in the low-wage sector for two scenarios: a competitive labor market and a monopsonistic labor market. Using data from the 2006 wave of the German Socio-Economic...