The determinants of apprenticeship training with particular reference tobusiness expectations

"Whilst in applied empirical research, training in general human capital is mainly explained by structural characteristics of firms, this paper introduces business expectations as an additional explanatory factor. Business expectations are strictly time-variate and firm-specific and reflect both a firm's development in competitive markets and in the business cycle. We assume that a firm's business expectations strongly modify the cost-utility concept for firms' decisions as regards providing apprenticeship places. When controlling for firms' structural characteristics, static econometric models support our assumption that a change in business expectations leads to an asymmetric adjustment process of firms' qualitative decisions regarding apprenticeship training. Concerning the quantitative decision as to how many apprenticeship places a firm provides we found a significant but not asymmetric response to a change in business expectations. A dynamic approach confirms the results obtained in the static models of a symmetric quantitative adjustment process in a short-term perspective. In a longer perspective the dynamic model supports the assumption of an asymmetric quantitative adjustment process. Further on an application shows that an increasing uncertainty regarding business expectations tends to reduce the apprenticeship training at firm level." (Author's abstract, IAB-Doku) ((en)) Additional Information Kurzfassung (deutsch) Executive summary (English)Ausbildungsverhalten - Determinanten, Betrieb, Ausbildungsbetrieb, Unternehmensentwicklung, Personalpolitik, Kosten-Nutzen-Analyse, Ausbildungskosten, betriebliche Berufsausbildung - Nutzen, betriebliche Berufsausbildung, Bildungsökonomie, Bildungsinvestitionen, wirtschaftliche Situation

Bargaining with endogenous disagreement: the extended Kalai-Smorodinsky solution

Following Vartiainen (2007) we consider bargaining problems in which no exogenous disagreement outcome is given. A bargaining solution assigns a pair of outcomes to such a problem, namely a compromise outcome as well as a disagreement outcome: the interpretation is that the latter results if the compromise outcome is not accepted. For this framework we propose and study an extension of the classical Kalai-Smorodinsky bargaining solution. We present a characterization with an axiom of Independence ofNon-Utopia Information as the main condition.mathematical economics;

Empirische Befunde zur selbständigen Erwerbstätigkeit unter besonderer Berücksichtigung scheinselbständiger Erwerbsverhältnisse (Empirical findings on self-employment taking particular account of nominally self-employed employment relationships)

"The number of self-employed people in Germany increased slightly from the early 1980s and has increased to a greater extent since the beginning of the 1990s. Starting from the 1970s a considerable change has been observed in the fields of activity of the self-employed, which has always been an extremely heterogeneous group. Thus the sector-specific distribution of the selfemployed has changed clearly, but also the group composition of the self-employed has undergone a far-reaching change. There has been an increase in the number of women and foreigners turning to this form of employment; with regard to qualification level, it was primarily graduates from institutions of higher education. Self-employment has always also constituted a field of activity for working people who work solely for themselves, without employees (in employment relationships subject to social insurance). With some slight fluctuations about 50% of all the self-employed were of this type. In this context particular consideration must be paid to workers who are referred to as nominally self-employed. The term nominally self-employed refers to workers who are in fact like selfemployed people, but must be assessed as workers in dependent employment as a result of their specific employment situation (the material contractual relationship) and in accordance with the particular concept used to distinguish the forms of employment. If formally self-employed individuals are actually to be assessed as workers in dependent employment, then they have protection with regard to both employment law and social law, as well as the obligations as an employee in accordance with the legal regulations valid in Germany for employees. On the basis of an extensive survey (IAB study of the nominally self-employed) the article shows the significance of the choice of model used for differentiation in the identification of nominally self-employed people both in quantitative and in qualitative respects. Thus not only the extent of the employment identified as nominal self-employment but also the distribution of the group of workers determined in this way depends considerably on the choice of differentiation model for example in occupational, material and social respects." (Author's abstract, IAB-Doku) ((en))Selbständige - Statistik, Scheinselbständige, berufliche Selbständigkeit - Determinanten, Geschlechterverteilung, Nationalität, Altersstruktur, berufliche Qualifikation, sektorale Verteilung, Westdeutschland, Ostdeutschland, Bundesrepublik Deutschland

Pressure-Induced Alterations in the Protein Pattern of the Thermophilic Archaebacterium Methanococcus thermolithotrophicus

Elevated hydrostatic pressure has been shown to affect the growth rate of the thermophilic methanobacterium Methanococcus thermolithotrophicus without extending its temperature range of viability. Analysis of the cell inventory after approximately 10 h of incubation at 65 degrees C and 50 MPa (applying high-pressure liquid chromatography and two-dimensional gel electrophoresis) proved that pressure induces alterations in the protein pattern and the amino acid composition of the total cell hydrolysate. Gels showed that after pressurization a series of (basic) proteins with a molecular mass in the range of 38 and 70 kilodaltons occurs which is not detectable in cells grown at normal atmospheric pressure. The question of whether the observed alterations are caused by the perturbation of the balance of protein synthesis and turnover or by the pressure-induced synthesis of compounds analogous to heat shock proteins remains unanswered