The currently discussed increase in inequality within many countries arise not only from higher poverty rates but also from the growing population at the upper end of the distribution and the resulting tensions between rich and poor. The rise of wealth in several dimensions was coming back as an...

The enlargement of the European Union in May 2004 by ten new member states bear increasing challenges in creating social cohesion among its citizens and regions. Social cohesion is understood here in a broad sense as a coalescence of European societies in such a way that living conditions and...

Social scientists and media commentators have expressed concern that Western countries are becoming two-thirds societies in which two-thirds enjoy the benefits of affluence, while one-third are locked into poverty or near-poverty. This paper, based on economic panel data, tests the two-thirds...

What has happened to incomes, inequality and satisfaction with living standards in the first stage of transition from a communist command economy to a market economy in East Germany? This paper tests six hypotheses about the transition to capitalism. Contrary to expectations, real incomes went...

Using data from the German Socio-Economic Panel (N=6950), this paper analyses equivalent income mobility in West Germany, 1984-93. Four hypotheses, derived from recent North American research and from sociological theory (stratification theory) are tested. They are: 1. that in West Germany, as...

[Quality of Life - A Multidimensional Approach] The term “quality of life research” refers to a general theoretical framework rather than to a specific theory of welfare or well-being. Most of the various definitions and conceptions of quality of life within this framework cite the...

This report examines how income groups and forms of employment in Germany have changed in the past two decades. Since the mid-1990s, inequality in disposable household income in Germany has generally increased. This trend was in effect until 2005. While fewer people had disposable incomes in the...