The Effects of Active Labour Market Policies for Immigrants Receiving Social Assistance in Denmark

We estimate the effect of active labour market programmes on the exit rate to regular employment for non-western immigrants in Denmark who receive social assistance. We use the timing-of-events duration model and rich administrative data. We find large positive post-programme effects, and, surprisingly, even most in-programme effects are positive. The effects are largest for subsidized employment programmes, but effects are also large and significant for direct employment programmes and other programmes. The effects are larger if programmes begin after six months of unemployment. Implications of our estimates are illustrated by calculating effects on the duration to regular employment over a five-year period.programme evaluation, duration analysis, timing-of-events model

Do Single Women Value Early Retirement more than Single Men?

The focus of this paper is to analyse why a large fraction of single elderly people choose to retire early. A structural model directly based on the individual decision of labour supply is estimated on a sample of singles, where singles are defined as those who are living alone. We find that income and health are important determinants of the retirement decision. Furthermore, we find substantial gender differences in the retirement pattern. Healthy single women value retirement more than healthy single men and are willing to reduce their disposable income to 74 per cent of their previous income while men are willing to reduce the income to 81 per cent. Men’s retirement decision is mainly influenced by income and health, whereas women’s retirement decision is also affected by education and unemployment experience.retirement; gender differences; singles; panel data; option value

The effects of active labour market policies for immigrants receiving social assistance in Denmark

We estimate the effect of active labour market programmes on the exit rate to regular employment for non-western immigrants in Denmark who receive social assistance. We use the timing-of-events duration model and rich administrative data. We find large positive post-programme effects, and, surprisingly, even most in-programme effects are positive. The effects are largest for subsidized employment programmes, but effects are also large and significant for direct employment programmes and other programmes. The effects are larger if programmes begin after six months of unemployment. Implications of our estimates are illustrated by calculating effects on the duration to regular employment over a five-year period

The Times They are A-Changin'

This article compares and contrasts male immigrant labor market experiences in Sweden and Denmark during the period 1985 - 1995. Using register-based panel data sets from Sweden and Denmark, a picture of the employment assimilation process of immigrants from Norway, Poland, Turkey, and Iran is brought forth. The comparative approach shows that immigrants in Sweden and Denmark experienced similar declines in employment prospects between 1985 and 1995 despite quite different developments of aggregate labor market conditions. The explanation offered here is that the changing organizational structure – towards more flexible work organization - has resulted in a decrease in the attractiveness of immigrant employees due to the increasing importance of country-specific skills and informal human capital

The effects of active labour market policies for immigrants receiving social assistance in Denmark

We estimate the effect of active labour-market programmes on the exit rate to regular employment for non-western immigrants in Denmark who receive social assistance. We use the timing-of-events duration model and rich administrative data. We find large positive post-programme effects, and, surprisingly, even most in-programme effects are positive. The effects are largest for subsidized employment programmes, but effects are also large and significant for direct employment programmes and other programmes. Effects are larger if programmes begin after six months of unemployment. Implications of our estimates are illustrated by calculating effects on the duration to regular employment over a five-year period

Qualifications, Discrimination, or Assimilation? An Extended Framework for Analysing Immigrant Wage Gaps

In this paper, we analyze immigrant wage gaps and propose an extension of the traditional wage decomposition technique, which is a synthesis from two strains of literature on ethnic/immigrant wage differences, namely the ?assimilation literature? and the ?discrimination literature?. We estimate separate wage equations for natives and a number of immigrant groups using panel data sample selection models. Based on the estimations, we find that the immigrant wage gap is caused by a lack of qualifications and incomplete assimilation, and that a large fraction of that gap would disappear if only immigrants could find employment and thus accumulate work experience

Employment and Wage Assimilation of Male First Generation Immigrants in Denmark

Labour market assimilation of Danish first generation male immigrants is analysed based on two panel data sets covering the population of immigrants and 10% of the Danish population during 1984-1995. Wages and employment probabilities are estimated jointly in a random effects model which corrects for unobserved cohort and individual effects and panel selectivity due to missing wage information. The results show that immigrants assimilate partially to Danes, but the assimilation process differs between refugees and non-refugees

Intergenerational Transmissions and the School-to-Work Transition of 2nd Generation Immigrants

We analyse the extent of intergenerational transmission through parental capital, ethnic capital and neighbourhood effects on several aspects of the school-to-work transition of 2 nd generation immigrants and young ethnic Danes. The main findings are that parental capital has strong positive effects on the probability of completing a qualifying education and on the entry into the labour market, but it has a much smaller impact on the duration of the first employment spell and on the wage level. Growing up in neighbourhoods with a high concentration of immigrants is associated with negative labour market prospects both for young natives and 2 nd generation immigrants

The effect of integration policies on the time until regular employment of newly arrived immigrants: evidence from Denmark

We analyse the effect of active labour-market programmes on the hazard rate into regular employment for newly arrived immigrants using the timing-of-events duration model. We take account of language course participation and progression in destination country language skills. We use rich administrative data from Denmark. We find substantial lock-in effects of participation in active labour-market programmes. Post programme effects on the hazard rate to regular employment are significantly positive for wage subsidy programmes, but not for other types of programmes. For language course participants, improvement in language proficiency has significant and substantial positive effects on the hazard rate to employment