The goal of this project was twofold. The first objective was to find out to what extent publicly available beneficiary data (from managing authorities and commercial databases) could be used for quantitative, econometric counterfactual analysis. This led to a second objective: in the countries...

This paper analyzes the effectiveness of occupational training programs for the unemployed before and after the substantial amendments in German labor market legislation known as Hartz reforms. Based on the official evaluation of the reforms, we show that program impacts vary much across...

This paper assesses the dynamics of treatment effects arising from variation in the duration of training. We use German administrative data that have the extraordinary feature that the amount of treatment varies continuously from 10 days to 395 days (i.e. 13 months). This feature allows us to...

This study focuses on the effect of public funding on internal R&D investment and on total innovation intensity on a cross-country comparative level. Using harmonised micro data from five different countries, this study analyzes the heterogeneity of the use of policy instruments. Applying a...

This paper explores the impact of R&D subsidies on the concentration of R&D in an economy. First, governments are often criticized of subsidizing predominantly larger firms and thus contribute to persistence of leadership in markets and higher barriers to entry, and, hence, reduced competition...

In Germany, there is an ongoing debate about how to increase the efficiency of the social security system. The aim of this paper is to simulate different financing systems for Germany with its typical Conservative welfare state regime. For our analysis, we rely on the European static...

Mit der Einführung von Arbeitslosengeld II wurde auch die behördliche Zuständigkeit für die Grundsicherung einer grundlegenden Reorganisation unterzogen. Während in der überwiegenden Mehrheit der Kommunen in Form der sogenannten Arbeitsgemeinschaften eine Mischverwaltung aus Bundesagentur...

Die Arbeitsmarktreformen von 2003 bis 2005 haben entscheidend zu einer bemerkenswerten Trendumkehr auf dem deutschen Arbeitsmarkt beigetragen und damit auch einen wichtigen Beitrag geleistet, das Land besser auf die Konsequenzen des bevorstehenden demografischen Wandels vorzubereiten. Die...

Anders als im Steuerrecht existieren in der Sozialversicherung keine Kinderfreibeträge. In diesem Gutachten wird ihre Einführung - beschränkt auf die Beiträge zur gesetzlichen Rentenversicherung - untersucht. Abgeschätzt wurden zunächst die Erstrundeneffekte, also die Entlastungswirkungen...