This paper studies the relevance of social interactions among the unemployed. Identification is based on a salient and selective extension of the potential duration of unemployment benefits. If social interactions are important, this policy change affects entitled individuals not only directly,...

The potential duration of benefits is generally viewed as an important determinant of unemployment duration. This paper evaluates a unique policy change that prolonged entitlement to regular unemployment benefits from 30 weeks to a maximum of 209 weeks for elderly individuals in certain regions...

This paper analyzes the impact of the Austrian Regional Extended Benefit Program (REBP) on the labor market outcomes for elderly workers in Austria. The REBP extended entitlement to regular unemployment benefits from 30 weeks to a maximum of 209 weeks for elderly individuals in certain regions....

This paper studies a program that extends the maximum duration of unemployment benefits from 30 weeks to 209 weeks. Interestingly, this program is targeted to individuals aged 50 years or older, living in certain eligible regions in Austria. In the evaluation, I use sharp discontinuities in...

The labor market effects of pension reform stem from retirement behavior and from job search and hours worked of prime age workers. This paper investigates the impact of four often proposed policy measures for sustainable pensions: strengthening the tax benefit link, moving from wage to price...

This paper studies a program that extends the maximum duration of unemployment benefits from 30 weeks to 209 weeks. Interestingly, this program is targeted to individuals aged 50 years or older, living in certain eligible regions in Austria. In the evaluation, I use sharp discontinuities in...

We study the short-run effect of involuntary job loss on comprehensive measures of public health costs. We focus on job loss induced by plant closure, thereby addressing the reverse causality problem of deteriorating health leading to job loss as job displacements due to plant closure are...

There are considerable differences in the incidence of sickness, the pattern of diseases and the duration of episodes of sickness by age, gender, education and employment status. Employed have a significantly better health record than the unemployed. The question why this should be so is...

Unemployed workers suffer from poor health conditions, a fact which is documented by a large number of studies covering objective health measures, satisfaction with health status and mortality. This paper contributes to the literature with an empirical analysis of sick leave micro-data from...

Does the low wage sector serve as a stepping stone towards integration into better-paid jobs or at least towards integration of jobless people into employment? There is evidence for a "low-wage trap" and for a high risk of low-wage earners to get unemployed, but this may also be due to sorting...