Wealth inequality in Europe and the delusive egalitarianism of Scandinavian countries

Past sociological inequality research focused on (labor) market outcomes, while neglecting the even more important role of wealth. In our study we investigate the distribution of wealth among the elderly across Europe within the framework of Esping-Andersen’s typology of welfare states. Using SHARE data, our analyses suggest (1) that there is strong variation in the distribution of wealth between European countries, and (2) that patterns of wealth inequality differ strongly from patterns of income inequality. Surprisingly high levels of wealth disparity were found in the social democratic welfare regimes commonly known as very egalitarian societies. We conclude that Esping-Andersen’s scheme requires reconsideration because it is based on a one-sided understanding of social stratification not accounting for the central role of wealth in the stratification process.Inequality, wealth, net worth, income, SHARE, stratification, welfare state, Europe

Increasing employment instability among young people? Labor market entries and early careers in Germany since the mid-1980s

´"In the light of rising economic uncertainty, employers increasingly try to transfer market risks to their employees and to establish more flexible employment relationships. Young people are supposed to be especially exposed to labor market flexibilization as the lack of seniority, work experience, lobby, and networks make it possible to shift precarious employment forms to them. In our paper, we investigate whether employment instabilities are indeed rising among young people in Germany and whether certain groups of young people are at a particularly high risk. Our analyses are based on data from the German Socio-Economic Panel (GSOEP) and refer to the period since the mid-1980s; they include young people from Eastern and Western Germany as well as migrants of three different educational cohorts. To capture employment instabilities among young people in Germany, we focus (1) on the duration of first job search, (2) on the risk of fixed-term employment in the first job, (3) on the risk of unemployment after having entered first employment, and (4) the re-entry chances of unemployed persons. Our analyses show that young people face increasing difficulties at labor market entry in recent years: it takes them a longer time to find a first job; a rising share of them is confronted with unemployment directly after leaving the educational system; and starting the employment career in a fixed-term contract is more frequent nowadays. We find growing employment turbulence also in the early career: unemployment risks have been rising for those who have already found a job. Flexible forms of employment (fixed-term positions) seem to be particularly at risk to end in unemployment. Furthermore, it has become more difficult to reenter employment after a phase of unemployment. Employment instabilities do not hit all employees alike, but especially the lowly educated and the lower occupational classes as well as East Germans and migrants. The results indicate that qualification and class became increasingly important for young people's labor market chances since the mid-1980s. We thus find a relative strengthening of inequality structures among young people in Germany in an era of increasing labor market problems." (author's abstract

Increasing uncertainty in old age in Germany? The development of social inequality in later life since the mid-1980s

Im vorliegenden Arbeitspapier wird anhand von Daten des Soziooekonomischen Panels (SOEP) die Entwicklung von späten Erwerbskarrieren und des Übergangs in den Ruhestand in Deutschland von 1984 bis 2007 untersucht. Im Mittelpunkt steht die Frage, ob instabile Beschäftigungsverhältnisse unter den älteren Arbeitnehmern aufgrund der Flexibilisierungsprozesse auf dem Arbeitsmarkt zugenommen haben und ob bestimmte Gruppen der älteren Menschen davon betroffen sind. Ein besonderer Schwerpunkt wird auf die ökonomischen Konsequenzen der Veränderungen in den späten Erwerbskarrieren gelegt, die sich sowohl auf Männer und Frauen aus Ost- und Westdeutschland als auch auf die Gruppe der Migranten beziehen. Es werden drei verschiedene Geburtskohorten hinsichtlich folgender Fragestellungen untersucht: (1) das Risiko von Arbeitslosigkeit und die Chancen einer Wiederbeschäftigung in der späten Erwerbskarriere, (2) Muster der Einkommensmobilität von älteren Arbeitnehmern, (3) Zeitpunkt des Übergangs in den Ruhestand und (4) Einfluss dieser Entwicklungen auf das Renteneinkommen. (ICI

Is there a wrong time for a right decision? The impact of the timing of first births and the spacing of second births on women's careers

"Die Frage nach einer erfolgreichen Vereinbarkeit von Familie und Beruf stellt sich insbesondere in Westdeutschland, wo der institutionelle und normative Rahmen Mütter ermutigt, mehrere Jahre für die Betreuung ihrer Kleinkinder zuhause zu bleiben. Trotz umfassender Forschung zum Thema blieben bisher die Fragen offen, inwiefern weibliche Karrieren durch die zeitliche Einbettung der überwiegend zwei Geburten in die Erwerbsbiografien beeinflusst werden und ob sich Bildungsgruppen darin unterscheiden. Bisher konzentrierte sich die Forschung dahingehend vor allem auf das Timing der Erstgeburt: Um sich fest am Arbeitsmarkt zu etablieren scheint eine gewisse Verzögerung der Erstgeburt hilfreich. Bezüglich des Spacings zwischen Erst und Zweitgeburt liegen hingegen zwei Strategien nahe: Entweder bekommen Frauen ihre Kinder kurz nacheinander um danach endgültig an den Arbeitsmarkt zurückzukehren, oder sie nutzen einen langen Abstand zwischen den Kindern für eine berufliche Episode. Mithilfe eines NEPS-Samples zweifacher Mütter kann die Studie aufzeigen, dass ihr berufliches Prestige zwischen Karriereeinstieg und dem Alter 45 insbesondere von der Episode nach der ersten Geburt beeinträchtigt wird. Obwohl dies nicht durch ein bestimmtes Timing bedingt ist, er-weist sich das Timing höher gebildeter Frauen als am wenigsten nachteilig. Für das Spacing zeigt sich, dass nur höher gebildete Frauen nach ihren Betreuungsphasen noch Prestige anhäufen können, so sie denn ihre Kinder im kurzen Abstand zueinander bekommen. Die Prestigeentwicklung von Frauen mit geringerer Bildung hingegen wird nicht wesentlich durch das Spacing vermindert, außer sie entscheiden sich kurz nach der Geburt des ersten Kindes für die Rückkehr in einen Teilzeiterwerb." (Autorenreferat)"The issue of how to reconcile family and work is particularly relevant in the light of West Germany's institutional and normative framework which has been facilitating mothers of young children to withdraw from the labor market for some years. Though the topic has already been subject to academic debate, the questions remain if and how women's careers are influenced by the way women embed their prevalently two births into their employment biographies as well as if educational groups differ in these effects. So far, research has mainly focused on the first birth's timing: aspirations to establish firmly on the labor market suggest a postponement of the first birth to some degree. The effect is less obvious for the spacing between first and second births: to avoid a detrimental career discontinuity, women can either choose a short spacing, blocking their periods of unpaid caregiving tightly for a quick and definite occupational return, or space their births widely, intermitting their parental leaves with periods of employment. Using NEPS data for West German mothers of two, the study finds that compared to career entry, the occupational prestige at age 45 is severely impaired by the period after women's first birth. While this is not affected by a specific timing, higher educated women tend to time their firstbirths least detrimentally. With regard to the spacing, evidence suggests that only higher educated women can achieve to continue their prestige accumulation, namely by spacing their births very tightly. Lower and intermediately educated women's prestige, in contrast, cannot be impaired considerably by their spacing behavior, unless they decide to return to part-time employment soon after their first birth." (author's abstract

National patterns of income and wealth inequality

The aim of this article is to show that wealth must be treated as a distinct dimension of social stratification alongside income. In a first step, we explain why social stratification researchers have largely overlooked wealth in the past and present a detailed definition of wealth by differentiating it from income. In the empirical part of the article, we analyze the distribution of wealth across 18 countries, and we describe and compare national patterns of wealth inequality to those of income inequality making use of different data sources. Our results show – first – that there is strong variation in the distribution of wealth between these 18 countries, and – second – that levels of wealth inequality significantly differ from levels of income inequality in about half of the countries analyzed. Surprisingly high levels of wealth inequality we find in Sweden and Denmark, two countries widely considered being highly egalitarian societies. Conversely, the Southern European countries – where income inequality is relatively high – exhibit comparatively low levels of wealth inequality

Beeinflussen berufstypische Arbeitszeitmerkmale die Unterbrechungsdauer von Frauen? Eine längsschnittliche Analyse der Bedeutung beruflicher Merkmale für die Berufsrückkehr von Müttern in Deutschland

"Der Beitrag geht der Frage nach, ob berufstypische Arbeitszeitmerkmale die Erwerbsunterbrechungsdauer von Frauen nach der Familiengründung beeinflussen und welche Bedeutung berufstypische Arbeitszeitmerkmale für Frauen mit unterschiedlichem Bildungsniveau haben. Dazu wurden die Längsschnittdaten der Erwachsenenkohorte des Nationalen Bildungspanels über ein Daten-Linkage mit aggregierten Berufsdaten aus dem Mikrozensus angereichert. Die Ergebnisse der empirischen Analysen zeigen, dass sich berufstypische Arbeitszeiten neben Individualmerkmalen signifikant auf die Berufsrückkehr von Müttern auswirken. Für hochqualifizierte Frauen erwiesen sich lediglich die für einen Beruf typischen Überstunden als einflussreich. Dieses Ergebnis deutet darauf hin, dass die Rückkehr von Akademikerinnen aufgrund von höheren Opportunitätskosten und womöglich auch einer höhere Erwerbsneigung durch die arbeitszeitlichen Gegebenheiten im Austrittberuf kaum tangiert ist. Für mittel- und insbesondere geringqualifizierte Frauen sind jedoch andere Faktoren, nämlich die Arbeitszeitlänge, die Verbreitung von Heimarbeit und - für beruflich nicht qualifizierte Frauen - auch die Verbreitung von Nacht- und Wochenendarbeit relevant. Insgesamt legen unsere Ergebnisse nahe, dass berufstypische Arbeitszeiten insbesondere für die Unterbrechungsdauer von geringgebildeten Müttern eine bedeutende Rolle spielen." (Autorenreferat)"This article analyses how occupation-specific hours of employment influence the employment interruptions of women after family formation, and whether employment hours have an impact on different educational groups. This study uses detailed longitudinal data from the German National Educational Panel Study and aggregated occupational data from the Microcensus. Our results show how occupation-specific employment hours, even after controlling for individual characteristics, significantly influence the employment interruptions of mothers. The interruption duration of women with tertiary education is solely influenced by the amount of overtime working hours associated with specific occupations. This result indicates that the return-to-work of tertiary educated women remain mostly unaffected by their hours of employment, and likely to be attributed to both elevated opportunity costs and higher career orientations. Whilst medium and less educated women reduce their time-out from their occupation when the working hours are short and working from home is possible. Atypical employment hours, such as night-shift or weekend work, are found to be exclusively relevant for less educated women. Overall, our results demonstrate that hours of employment play an important role for the employment continuity of women without a tertiary education." (author's abstract

Comparing late working life and retirement in Europe and the US : the development of social inequalities in times of globalization and aging societies

The main purpose of the country studies assembled in this book is to examine systematically how late employment careers, the timing of retirement and the level of pension incomes have changed over the last decades in the course of globalization, economic restructuring and demographic aging in a wide range of European and North American countries (Denmark, Estonia, Germany, Hungary, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, the United Kingdom and the United States)

Soziale Herkunft hat starken Einfluss : Warum Kinder aus Nicht-Akademikerfamilien seltener studieren

Die soziale Herkunft hat nach wie vor einen starken Einfluss auf den Bildungserwerb von Menschen. Dies zeigt sich auch am Übergang ins Studium. Prof. Dr. Sandra Buchholz und Prof. Dr. Monika Jungbauer- Gans vom Deutschen Zentrum für Hochschul- und Wissenschaftsforschung (DZHW) erklären, warum Kinder aus Nicht-Akademikerfamilien nach wie vor so selten studieren und wie sich dies erklären lässt

Использование информационно-коммуникационных источников для усовершенствования знаний старшекласников

This article examines the impact of the globalization process on individual life courses and employment careers in modern societies from an international comparative perspective. Empirical results are summarized from the GLOBALIFE research project (Life Courses in the Globalization Process), which studied the effects of globalization on life courses for the first time. As the results demonstrate, the globalization process has had diverse effects on different phases of the life course. Qualified men in their mid-careers are broadly protected from the effects of globalization, while young adults are the losers of the globalization process. We also find that educational and class characteristics determine the extent to which an individual faces increasing labour market risks. Under globalization, these effects have intensified. The results of the GLOBALIFE project thus indicate that globalization triggers a strengthening of existing social inequality structures. Another central finding is that globalization has not led to the same outcome across various modern societies. Globalization appears to be distinctly filtered by deeply embedded national institutions. These institutional packages entail diverse strategies of labour market flexibilization which themselves differentially shape patterns of social inequality in modern societies

Reversing Early Retirement in GermanyA Longitudinal Analysis of the Effects of Recent Pension Reforms on the Timing of the Transition to Retirement and on Pension Incomes

Dieser Beitrag untersucht die Auswirkungen und Risiken der jüngsten Rentenreformen in Deutschland. Während die deutsche Rentenpolitik über viele Jahre systematisch die Frühverrentung gefördert hat, um den regulierten Arbeitsmarkt in Zeiten wirtschaftlicher Stagnation zu entlasten, hat die Rentenpolitik in der jüngeren Vergangenheit einen deutlichen Paradigmenwechsel erfahren. Die jüngsten Reformen gehen von einem längeren Verbleib älterer Arbeitnehmer im Erwerbsleben aus. Anhand von Daten des Sozio-oekonomischen Panels (SOEP) sowie mithilfe von Längsschnittanalysen auf Mikroebene kommt dieser Beitrag zu dem Ergebnis, dass die aktuelle Trendwende im Bereich der Frühverrentung in Deutschland auf Kosten zunehmender sozialer Ungleichheiten innerhalb der älteren Bevölkerung geht.This article investigates the effects and risks of recent pension reforms in Germany. While German pension policy systematically supported early retirement for many years in order to relieve the regulated labour market in times of economic stagnation, there has been a substantial change of the pension policy paradigm in the more recent past. Latest reforms expect older people to prolong working life. Using data from the German Socio-Economic Panel (GSOEP) and applying micro-level longitudinal research methods, this contribution shows that the recent reversal of early retirement in Germany has been at the price of growing social inequalities in old age