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This paper compares interconnections between dominant economic thought and processes of policy-making in the area of labor market reforms in Germany in the late 1960s and the early 2000s. The transition in labor market policies in this period could be described as a change from an active to an activating approach. At the level of economic discourse these policy changes correspond to a paradigm shift from Keynesian to neoclassical/neoliberal economic thought. We investigated these changes by focusing on two distinct reforms of labor market policies and carried out a critical discourse analysis of the relevant public and academic discourse of economists. We find that the paradigm shift in economic thought was accompanied by a shift in economists' discourses on labor market policy issues. Against this backdrop we conclude that economic terms, concepts and theories associated with the transformation from the 'Keynesian planning euphoria' to the 'neoliberal bitter economic truth' had a significant impact on LMP reforms in Germany. By focusing not primarily on the concrete practices associated with the different approaches of LMP, but on the more abstract 'politico-economic rationalities' behind those practices our paper contributes to the analysis and critique of these reforms and their social implications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On the one hand, unemployment is known to have detrimental effects on individuals' mental health. On the other hand, poor mental health reduces re‐employment chances quite drastically, creating a vicious cycle. Active labour market policies (ALMPs) such as training programs or wage subsidies have been shown to ameliorate negative effects on mental health and improve labour market integration on average for the general unemployed population. In the context of individuals with severe mental health issues, however, it is unclear whether these interventions can be expected to deliver similar positive effects. In fact, one may argue that they have the potential to worsen employment prospects of individuals by adding additional stress to their pre‐existing mental health problems. Hence, this paper estimates the long‐term causal effects of ALMPs on the labour market integration of individuals with self‐reported severe mental health issues and compares estimates to individuals without such issues using unique combined survey and administrative data. Effects are estimated using the innovative double machine learning method and show that ALMPs do not only improve labour market integration of unemployed individuals with severe mental health issues, but they do so more effectively than for other unemployed individuals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Germany has undergone a significant migration policy shift since the early 2000s. This paper examines the total employment effect of immigration during the liberalization of migration policies from 2005 to 2018 using a regional approach. A set of methods, along with static and dynamic macro-econometric models, were applied on a balanced panel formed by a unique and first-hand-collected data for 156 statistical regions based on the definition of the German Federal Employment Agency. We find suggestive evidence that there has been a significant adverse impact of new immigrants on the overall employment rate, and this negative effect is substantially larger than those reported in previous studies on the employment effect of immigration in the German labor market. In a further step, we divide our sample into two subsamples to capture the employment effect of the massive humanitarian inflows that began in 2015. Our results indicate that, in addition to the new immigrants' lower rate of integration into the local labor markets, a sudden influx of asylum seekers may possibly lead to a substantial fall in the employment rates, because asylum seekers are not immediately allowed to work in the country. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper comparatively analyzes strategies of German Jobcenters to bring native and immigrant job seekers into employment. It focuses on clients who receive means-tested basic income for the unemployed, based on data from the Panel Study Labour Market and Social Security (PASS) from year 2015 to 2020. By way of logistic regression, the study identifies the impact of being an immigrant on the clients' probability of reporting different kinds of offers like job referrals or courses, controlling for a number of other influential factors. The study also looks deeper into the effects of immigrant-specific attributes, such as heterogeneous German language skills. We found that the likelihood of offers by Jobcenters largely depends on the amount of time since immigration. Recent immigrants have the lowest chance of reporting most of the studied measures of active labor market policies. For immigrants having stayed more than 4 years in Germany, however, we do not find a disadvantage, and some measures out of Jobcenters' toolbox are even more often offered to the longer-settled immigrants than to native clients. A possible explanation for the moderately under-average support of recent immigrants in terms of Jobcenters' measures could be an institutional focus on improving German language skills prior to approaching the labor market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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This paper analyzes the policies for migrant economies as part of broader social and labor market in Germany. It points out that the current fragmented and contradictory policy action can be identified as an outcome of former ambiguities and the delegation of responsibilities within a complex governance grid. Accordingly, its focus is on the inter-related dynamics of policy interventions, knowledge production and the impact of migrant agency within cities. The paper gives a condensed overview on theory and background of migrant economies, pointing to de facto barriers that persist until today. It then concentrates on the way labor market policies in respect of migration were framed in public discourse. Its empirical focus is on the web of policies and instruments that have been directed towards migrant entrepreneurship. Here, in-built ambiguities of all actions are identified as a general feature of German labor market policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Bilimname is the property of IBAV (Research Foundation of Theological Science) and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

In 2003-05 the German government implemented a number of far-reaching labor market reforms, the so-called Hartz reforms. At the heart of the reform package was the Hartz IV law, which resulted in a significant cut in the unemployment benefits for the long-term unemployed. The paper develops a macroeconomic model with search and incomplete markets, calibrates the model economy to German data and institutions, and uses the calibrated model economy to simulate the effects of the Hartz reforms, and in particular Hartz IV, on the German labor market. The paper finds that the Hartz IV reform reduced the noncyclical unemployment rate in Germany by 1.4 percentage points. Employed workers benefited from the Hartz IV reform in welfare terms, but unemployed workers lost. It further finds that the Hartz I-III reforms reduced the noncyclical unemployment rate in Germany by 1.5 percentage points. Finally, the authors' analysis suggests that the Hartz reforms contributed to the good performance of the German labor market during the Great Recession. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Journal for Labour Market Research is the property of Springer Nature and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

In 2008/09 many countries all over the world were hit by a deep recession. At the beginning of the economic and financial crises a discussion about the practicability of financial participation of employees as an instrument to overcome the crises was initiated in Germany. Especially liquidity and productivity arguments were mentioned. This paper explores empirically whether firms having financial participation schemes of employees were better off during this turbulent time period. We focus on the function of financial participation schemes to stabilize employment and to avoid human capital losses, which is quite important in economic downturns. Our empirical analysis is based on the IAB-Establishment Panel Survey, which consists of almost 16,000 interviews every year. Our findings reveal that profit sharing and employee share ownership schemes are not outstanding crisis instruments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose -- This paper aims to present the IZA Evaluation Dataset, a newly created data source allowing for the evaluation of active labor market policies in Germany. Design/methodology/approach -- The paper's approach is a description of the sampling and contents of the IZA Evaluation Dataset and an outline of its research potential. Findings -- The evaluation of active labor market policies is often confronted with a lack of adequate empirical data. The IZA Evaluation Dataset may serve as a role model for the provision of such data. Research limitations/implications -- The scope of active labor market policy instruments that can be analyzed with the IZA Evaluation Dataset is mainly restricted to measures for unemployed individuals. Originality/value -- In recent years, many countries have opened their administrative databases for evaluation studies. However, information that might be relevant for economic modeling is often absent. The IZA Evaluation Dataset aims to overcome such limitations for Germany by complementing administrative data from the Federal Employment Agency with innovative survey data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose -- Labor market programs may affect unemployed individuals' behavior before they enroll. The aim of this paper is to study whether such ex ante effects differ according to ethnic origin. Design/methodology/approach -- The authors apply a method that relates self-reported perceived treatment rates and job search behavioral outcomes, such as the reservation wage or search intensity, to each other. German native workers are compared with migrants with a Turkish origin or Central and Eastern European (including Russian) background. Job search theory is used to derive theoretical predictions. The ex ante effect of the German active labor market program (ALMP) system is examined using the novel IZA Evaluation Data Set which includes self-reported assessments of the variables of interest as well as an unusually detailed amount of information on behavior, attitudes and past outcomes. Findings -- It is found that the ex ante threat effect on the reservation wage and search effort varies considerably among the groups considered. Originality/value -- The study is the first to investigate whether migrants and natives react similarly to the expectation of participating in an ALMP, and whether migrants of different regions of origin react similarly or not. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary The Great Recession triggered a resurgence of short-time work (STW) throughout the OECD. Several countries introduced STW from scratch or significantly expanded the scope of the programmes already in place. In some countries like Italy, Japan and Germany between 2.5% and 5% of the workforce participated in STW schemes at the trough of the recession. In this paper we analyse the rationale for STW benefits and their effects on labour adjustment from both a cross-country and a time-series perspective. We find that STW actually contributed to reduce job losses during the Great Recession. However, the number of jobs saved, according to our macroeconomic and microeconomic estimates, is smaller than the number of participants in these schemes and the full-time equivalent jobs involved, pointing in some countries to sizeable deadweight costs. Other institutions, like plant-level bargaining over hours, wages and employment levels, may be more effective than STW in encouraging adjustment along the intensive margins in the presence of temporary shocks. Our results also suggest that STW cannot be readily extended to countries having much different institutional configurations as the demand for STW is very much affected by other institutions such as employment protection legislation and the degree of centralization of collective bargaining. Furthermore, STW must be temporary as during upturns may actually negatively affect employment. We also find that specific design features of STW - such as experience-rating and disincentives to 100% reductions in working hours - are important in improving the cyclical properties of STW. - Tito Boeri and Herbert Bruecker [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Arbeit is the property of De Gruyter and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Sozialer Fortschritt is the property of Duncker & Humblot GmbH and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Purpose -- The paper aims to present an analysis of the indirect and direct effects of active labour market policy measures at the regional level for Western Germany. Design/methodology/approach -- Most evaluation studies of active labour market policy focus on the microeconometric treatment effect using individual data and do not account for possible indirect effects like deadweight and substitution effects. The present study uses a dynamic specification of the augmented matching function at the regional level. A dynamic panel data model is estimated using monthly and regional variation of different labour market programmes as explanatory variables. Furthermore, spatial interactions are taken into account by adding a spatially correlated error term. Findings -- Almost no significant negative effects are found of the stock of participants in programmes of labour market policy on the number of outflows from unemployment into regular jobs. Thus, contrary to findings at the individual level, no lock-in effect is found. The number of programme participants does not reduce the number of outflows from unemployment. On the other hand when looking not at the stocks but on the outflows from programmes, no positive effects on outflows from unemployment at the regional level are found. Research limitations/implications -- Because of data limitations only a period up to six months after completing a programme is used. Originality/value -- The authors distinguish between the effects of the stock of programme participants and of the outflows from programmes. Furthermore, the authors account for spatially correlated error terms by using a GM estimator proposed by Muff in 2006. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The distribution of European and national aid among 271 German labor market regions is considered as an optimization problem with three targets: (i) interregional equalization of unemployment rates; (ii) minimization of total (national) unemployment; and (iii) maximization of GDP, subject to budget constraints and some administrative restrictions. The analysis of the German program in 2000–2002 shows that the results actually obtained for 6 billion euro required only 241 million euro under optimal planning (4% of the actual budget). Such an inappropriate implementation of active labor market policies can be the cause of low efficiency, often misinterpreted as uselessness. This paper suggests a decision aid for optimal planning and shows that tax returns from the additional GDP due to jobs subsidized can transform regional policy into a winning governmental strategy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The German labour market is in dire need of regulatory changes. The Hartz Commission was assigned the task to provide measures for the reform of German labour market policy. This paper, analyses whether the suggestions of the commission promise a substantial improvement of labour market policy with the intended effect of a large decrease in unemployment. To check this, results from theoretical and empirical labour market research are used to create a benchmark. The suggestions of the commission are checked against this benchmark. The result is, however, that the suggested policies of the commission are not well suited to provide a substantial reduction of unemployment. In the final part of the paper, the reason for political failure in this area is analysed as well as the role of commissions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Copyright of Sozialer Fortschritt is the property of Duncker & Humblot GmbH and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Sozialer Fortschritt is the property of Duncker & Humblot GmbH and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Changes in European and German social and labour market policies have particular consequences for the transition into adulthood of disadvantaged young people. This paper discusses these effects, especially as they impinge upon those who, as a result of such changes, leave social care earlier than planned. In so doing, they often come under the provisions of the employment promotion system, which provides insufficient support for them in light of their difficult life circumstances. By employing autobiographical narratives and reconstructions, the consequences of these sociopolitical changes are described in detail. Three typical ''trap situations'' are created under such conditions for young adults and their educational facilitators. These will be explained with reference to case studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Zeitschrift für Sozialreform is the property of De Gruyter and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Sozialer Fortschritt is the property of Duncker & Humblot GmbH and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

In this paper, we attempt to renew the interest in marginal employment subsidies. Such subsidies are paid only for a firm's additional employment exceeding some reference level and create larger employment stimuli at lower fiscal costs than general wage subsidies for all workers. If the hiring of a new employee also entails subsidizing an incumbent worker (double marginal subsidization), the replacement of regular paid workers by outsourcing employment to newly established firms – a standard critique of marginal employment subsidies – can be avoided. This additional subsidy reduces the incentive to crowd out regular employment and results in even larger employment effects. Applying the subsidy scheme to the low-skill labor market in Germany, we show that employment can be substantially increased without imposing additional fiscal burden. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reports results of an empirical study on the effectiveness of labour market policy. Data from Austria, France, Germany, Great Britain, Sweden and the United States are used to apply a simultaneous equation model with wages and employment being the endogenous variables. In order to explain employment, the amount of unemployment benefits per unemployed (passive labour market policy) and payment for wage subsidies and training per employed and unemployed person (active labour market policy) are used in addition to real wages and output. Wages and output have their expected impact on total employment. It turns out that passive labour market policy has a negative, and active labour market measures a positive, effect on the number of persons employed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of HAK İŞ International Journal of Labor & Society is the property of HAK-IS International Joumal of Labour & Society and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This article discusses the German labour market development during the Great Recession as well as in the years before and until 2015. Germany's labour market witnessed a strong upswing during the recent decade and performed remarkably well in the Great Recession. Structural reforms before the crisis had improved the functioning of the labour market and initiated a solid upward trend that also helped overcome the crisis. High establishment-level flexibility allowed buffering the severe drop in GDP. While the employment upswing continued until today, critical developments concerned the increase in atypical jobs, weak wage growth and rising inequality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Copyright of Sosyal Bilimler Enstitüsü - Sosyal Bilimler Dergisi is the property of Karadeniz Technical University, Institute of Social Sciences and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Turning unemployment into self-employment has become a major focus of German active labour market policy (ALMP) in recent years. If effective, this would not only reduce Germany's persistently high unemployment rate, but also increase its notoriously low self-employment rate. Empirical evidence on the effectiveness of such programmes is scarce. We evaluate the effectiveness of two start-up programmes for the unemployed, where we include the probability of being employed, the probability of being unemployed and personal income as outcome variables. Our results show that at the end of the observation period, both programmes are effective. The considerable positive effects present a stark contrast to findings from evaluations of other German ALMP programmes in recent years. Hence, ALMP programmes aimed at moving the unemployed into self-employment may prove to be among the most effective, both in Germany and elsewhere. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Sozialer Fortschritt is the property of Duncker & Humblot GmbH and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Fixed-term contracts in Europe have recently become the subject of both policy and research interest, seen as particularly relevant in the transition from school to work. Some commentators argue that fixed-term contracts have an integrative function in the transition from school to work, providing a `bridge' to the labour market. A contrasting perspective is that they hinder successful integration into the labour market by leading to a repeating cycle of fixed-term jobs and unemployment. We investigate this issue in Germany, a country with a regulated labour market and a `co-ordinated' transition from education to work. Using life history data we consider who gets a fixed-term contract at the beginning of working life in Germany and how this affects their subsequent labour market career. Our first key finding is that fixed-term contracts are found among those for whom the school-to-work transition is not so co-ordinated, including both high-skilled and low-skilled labour market entrants. Our second finding is that, after five years, the unemployment rates of those who started with fixed-term contracts and those who started with permanent contracts converge. Beginning working life with a fixed-term contract does not clearly signal a `bad start' in Germany. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A policy change tightened job search requirements regarding geographical mobility for unemployment insurance–benefit recipients in Germany. Those affected by the policy change were individuals without family ties and whose reemployment prospects were low in their home labor market region. The author finds that after one year the policy change led to a 4.6 percentage point increase in employment among women without children who lived in regions with relatively high unemployment. Women responded to the policy change by taking up jobs in their home labor market region as well as outside of that region. The author does not find any effects of the tightened mobility requirements for men. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is contested to what extent public employment services (PES) help build resilience in young unemployed people. Drawing on qualitative interviews with 19 people born in Germany and Norway between 1990 and 1995, the article examines stories about how PES, in two different activation regimes, help young people find meaningful work. The analysis and discussion are carried out within a theoretical framework that combines the capability approach with social resilience literature in a novel way. The findings show that PES are portrayed as being more present in young Germans' lives. The German informants seem to feel undue pressure from PES and they describe differences between personal aims and the "placement priority" of PES. Sanctions imposed by PES were also a much more predominant topic among the German informants. The Norwegian data were dominated by stories about young people in activation programmes who had been demotivated by being trapped in a cycle of programme participation, which did not result in employment. Across the two countries, our data suggest that PES rarely build social resilience: PES provided young people with a means to survive, but rarely helped to build their capacity to overcome their difficult situation. In line with previous research, the stories of young Germans and Norwegians also emphasise the need for a PES that provides tailor‐made services that build on young people's motivation and ambition. The article demonstrates that combining the capability approach with social resilience theory enables a dynamic perspective on the development of people's capabilities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a symmetrical debate in two Euro area core countries: in France about the restrictive fiscal policy of Germany, leading to a huge external surplus, in Germany about the insufficient compliance with fiscal rules and the lack of structural reforms in France. What are the real causes of the divergence between the two economies? We show that different indicators of competitiveness yield very different results depending on the base period used, e.g. 1995 (peak of reunification boom), 1999 or 1990. A comparison with the pre-unification period shows little gain in competitiveness. We also find, somewhat surprisingly, that Germany's industry is not more integrated in international value chains than that of France or Italy. We then look at the link between export growth and export prices and argue that in the long run exports are not driven by competitiveness but by the increased supply of labor resulting from unification. In addition, we ask what drove 'wage moderation' in Germany: policy or the labor market. We finally analyse the longer-term trend in fiscal policy and the resulting distributional consequences in both countries. Our more general policy implication is that any analysis which compares today to the trough of German performance after unification risks over-estimating the potential of the country. Given that the 'internal unification' process is complete now, one should not expect the Germans to continue to outperform France as it has done over the last two decades. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present empirical evidence suggesting that technological progress in the digital age will be biased not only with respect to skills acquired through education but additionally with respect to non‐cognitive skills (personality). We measure the direction of technological change by estimated future digitalization probabilities of occupations, and non‐cognitive skills by the Big Five personality traits from four German worker surveys. Even though we control for education and work experience, we find that workers who are more open to experience, emotionally more stable and less agreeable will tend to be less susceptible to digitalization. We also find that future technological progress may not continue to hollow out the middle class as much as it did in the recent past. These results suggest that education and labor market policies should put more emphasis on children's and workers' personalities to strengthen their labor market resilience in the digital age. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the implementation of the activation approach, formulated by the American political scientist Lawrence Mead and the British sociologist Anthony Giddens, the labor market policy has been reformed in Germany and many other industrialized countries, since the mid-1990s. A fundamental component of the realignment is that welfare payments are tied more strictly than previously to the acceptance of employment. While in the U.S.A., the new labor market policy is characterized by the 'workfare' motto, in Germany, the foundations of the activation are formulated with the guiding principle 'support and demand'. Nevertheless, due to the shortage of public funds subsidies were cut sharply in recession phases but not increased adequately during the periods of economic recovery. As a result, the promotional elements of the activation concept are far outweighed by enforcement measures, leaving the unemployed to accept less attractive non-standard work. However, even with favorable economic conditions, even a relatively small number of atypical employees successfully made the transition to regular full-time employment. Therefore, in order to facilitate career advancement additional support would be required, which will not end with the recruitment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the book "The German and Dutch Economies: Who Follow Whom?," edited by Lei Delsen and Eelke de Jong. The book consists of six papers that were presented at a conference in October 1996 at the Centre for German Studies of the University of Nijmegen. These papers consider whether Germany might do well to follow the model of the Netherlands in terms of institutional structure, welfare state and labor market policy or vice versa. These papers discuss wage bargaining, labor markets and macroeconomic performance in Germany and the Netherlands and employment systems in the Netherlands and Germany.

Economists, and also economic research institutes, differ in their attitudes toward desirability of economic policies. The policy positions taken can often be determined by ideology. We examine economic policy positions by investigating minority votes in the Joint Economic Forecast of German economic research institutes. The data set consists of voting behavior over the period 1950-2014. Our results show that the German Institute for Economic Research (DIW Berlin) submitted by far the most minority votes, consistent with the popular impression that the DIW exhibits a preference for demand-oriented economic policy and has differed from other leading economic research institutes in this respect. For example, the rate of minority voting of the DIW corresponded to some 300 percent of the rate of minority voting of the RWI Essen. Minority votes display an economic research institute's identity. When institutes are known to be associated with specific economic policy positions, politicians, clients, and voters well understand how to assess the bias in the policy advice that is given. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents English language abstracts of reports published in this issue including topics such as welfare state institutions, economization of social services, and labor market policy in Great Britain and Germany.

This article shows that combining the multiple streams framework with historical institutionalism can help improve both the understanding and explanation of far-reaching, path-departing policy reforms. This argument is illustrated using two case studies that deal with activating labor market reforms in Germany and Sweden. This comparison highlights that path dependency prevails until policy entrepreneurs use political windows to manipulate the policy-making process by altering policy discourses and thinking until the new paradigm is made compatible with the old order. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although interests inhabit a central place in the multiple streams framework (MSF), interest groups have played only a minor role in theoretical and empirical studies until now. In Kingdon's original conception, organized interests are a key variable in the politics stream. Revisiting Kingdon's concept with a particular focus on interest groups and their activities-in different streams and at various levels-in the policy process, we take this argument further. In particular, we argue that specifying groups' roles in other streams adds value to the explanatory power of the framework. To do this, we look at how interest groups affect problems, policies, and politics. The influence of interest groups within the streams is explained by linking the MSF with literature on interest intermediation. We show that depending on the number of conditions and their activity level, interest groups can be involved in all three streams. We illustrate this in case studies reviewing labor market policies in Germany and chemicals regulation at the European level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present first empirical results on the effects of a large scale reduction in unemployment benefit entitlement lengths on unemployment inflows in Germany. We show that this highly disputed element of the Hartz-Reforms in 2006 induced a rush of workers and firms to take advantage of the previous legislation in its last days. Furthermore, we find a considerable decline in transitions to unemployment and an increase in employment rates among older workers after the reform. Our results provide new evidence for the importance of changes in unemployment inflows for the analysis of changes in unemployment outflows. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

From 2005 to 2015, the German government implemented a special programme for jobseekers aged 50 plus and receiving minimum income benefits. Descriptive comparisons and econometric evaluation indicate that this programme was more effective and cost-efficient than the German jobcentres' standard operations. However, our evaluation did not ascertain any particular instrument or technique which would explain this accomplishment. Rather, the formula for success appears to be hidden in the governance and design of the programme which differed markedly from routine support. Network-type governance mechanisms as applied in this programme appear to have served as an expedient in circumstances where hierarchical steering is no longer feasible. This article explains how the governance dilemma of the German Public Employment Service's 'second tier' (serving recipients of minimum income benefits) probably triggered the innovative approach so successfully pursued in the programme under consideration. The analysis is concluded by proposing some conceptual clarifications for the long-standing debate about hierarchies/bureaucracies, markets and networks in the governance of welfare programmes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

European integration through mutual recognition has facilitated the growth of a pan- European labour supply system in which transnational subcontractors 'post' workers from low-wage areas to higher wage areas. This allows employers to create spaces of exception in which the national industrial relations system of the country where work occurs does not fully apply. Drawing on interviews with managers, workers, unionists and works councillors at the European Central Bank construction site in Frankfurt, Germany, this article shows how transnational subcontracting allows employers to access, and create competition between, sovereign regulatory regimes. It concludes that high-cost, high-collective good national systems such as the German one, which depend on territorial boundedness for their integrity, are likely to be destabilized by this aspect of European integration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the study on the counseling and monitoring of unemployed individuals in Germany. It describes the possible contribution of the counseling and monitoring of the unemployed on the assessment of active labor market policy. It also explores the timing of three events considered crucial in job seeking which are vacancy referrals, individual integration contracts, and invitations to meetings with the caseworker.

. At the height of the economic crisis in mid-2009, the number of Germany's short-time workers peaked at 1.5 million. Unemployment would otherwise have increased by approximately twice as much as it did. But while short-time work certainly helped to cushion the labour market impact of the crisis, the authors caution that the country's specific circumstances preclude simple generalizations regarding its global effectiveness. Moreover, they argue, subsequent amendments to the regulatory framework made the scheme vulnerable to abuse, as reflected in the significant numbers of short-term workers in industries unaffected by the crisis and the emergence of a pattern of 'long-term' short-time work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]