This paper provides an overview of the sequential shift towards activating labour market and social policy in Germany. It not only shows the changes in the instruments of active and passives labour market policies but also analyzes the implications of this change for the political economy, the...

Since the early 90's the West German firms have to deal with sharp changes of economic environment: the German Unification, the emerging competitors in the east European countries and the deregulation of several labour market institutions. We analyse the wage structure, the wage changes and the...

Using a linked employer-employee data set for Germany, this paper analyses wage setting in a cohort of newly founded and other establishments from 1997 to 2001. While theory provides alternative explanations for higher or lower wages in newly founded firms, we show empirically that start-ups...

We estimate short, medium, and long-run individual labor market effects of training programs for unemployed by following program participation on a monthly basis over a ten-year period. Since analyzing the effectiveness of training over such a long period is impossible with experimental data, we...

Long-term public sector sponsored training programs often show little or negative short-run employment effects and often it is not possible to assess whether positive long-run effects exist. Based on unique administrative data, this paper estimates the longrun differential employment effects of...

Based on unique administrative data, which has only recently become available, this paper estimates the employment effects of the most important type of public sector sponsored training in Germany, namely the provision of specific professional skills and techniques (SPST). Using the inflows into...

Using the IAB Employment Sample (IABS) covering 1980-2001 we investigate what impact the fall of the Iron Curtain has had on the skill structure of employment and wages in the western German districts neighbouring the Czech Republic. The introduction of free trade in this region, which has one...

Zentrales Anliegen des Beitrags ist es, den Zusammenhang zwischen dem Lohnregime - Anwendung eines Flächen- bzw. Haustarifvertrags oder von individuellen Lohnvereinbarungen - und der Höhe der betrieblichen Durchschnittslöhne sowie der Streuung der Löhne im Betrieb zu analysieren. Die...

Labour markets in most highly developed countries are marked by rising levels of skill segregation in the production process and increasing inequalities in skill-specific employment prospects. Local human capital has a likely effect on skill specific productivity levels and employment growth....