How to Succeed in a Transnational Labor Market: Job Search and Wages among Hungarian,Slovak, and Czech Commuters in Austria

This paper deals with job search strategies and wages among cross‐border commuters residing in the Central European Region (CENTROPE). Our main aim is to investigate the role of social networks as constitutive for job searching and for successful labor market integration. We build upon a theoretical framework developed by Aguilera and Massey, reflecting on the nexus of social networks, job search methods, and related labor market outcomes. Methodologically, we use a new quantitative survey on the employment careers of cross‐border commuters residing in the regions of the Czech Republic, Slovakia, and Hungary bordering on Austria, conducted in the winter/spring of 2012/2013 (N = 2,573). Our results corroborate the hypothesis that human and social capital resources as well as labor market characteristics serve as key factors for job search and labor market integration among cross‐border commuters in the CENTROPE transnational labor market.     

Aerodynamic roughness variation with vegetation: analysis in a suburban neighbourhood and a city park

Urban Ecosystems - Local aerodynamic roughness parameters (zero-plane displacement, z d , and aerodynamic roughness length, z 0 ) are determined for an urban park and a suburban neighbourhood with...     

Robust Inference for Near-Unit Root Processes with Time-Varying Error Variances

The autoregressive Cauchy estimator uses the sign of the first lag as instrumental variable (IV); under independent and identically distributed (i.i.d.) errors, the resulting IV t-type statistic is known to have a standard normal limiting distribution in the unit root case. With unconditional heteroskedasticity, the ordinary least squares (OLS) t statistic is affected in the unit root case; but the paper shows that, by using some nonlinear transformation behaving asymptotically like the sign as instrument, limiting normality of the IV t-type statistic is maintained when the series to be tested has no deterministic trends. Neither estimation of the so-called variance profile nor bootstrap procedures are required to this end. The Cauchy unit root test has power in the same 1/T neighborhoods as the usual unit root tests, also for a wide range of magnitudes for the initial value. It is furthermore shown to be competitive with other, bootstrap-based, robust tests. When the series exhibit a linear trend, however, the null distribution of the Cauchy test for a unit root becomes nonstandard, reminiscent of the Dickey-Fuller distribution. In this case, inference robust to nonstationary volatility is obtained via the wild bootstrap.     

The Ambivalent Appraisal of Job Demands and the Moderating Role of Job Control and Social Support for Burnout and Job Satisfaction

Social Indicators Research - Within an extended challenge–hindrance framework, it is assumed that job demands are subjectively appraised both as challenges (that is, as working conditions...     

Verzerrte Beteiligung

To cope with the erosion of civic engagement, the expansion of public participation is postulated an efficacious remedy. Many authors notice the drawback of low turnout with unequal and biased participation compared to institutional elections. As the very first, this article not only emphasizes biased participation, but empirically analyses the biased output of participation methods.The example is the referendum on Stuttgart 21 (S21) in the year 2011. The counterfactual result for nonvoters is predicted by linking macro and micro-data. Estimations on municipality-level show participation-bias above elections, but below petitions and demonstrations. The counterfactual result predicts an enhanced rejection of S21.     

More Jobs Through Less Employment Protection? Evidence for West Germany

ABSTRACT: In reaction to growing criticism of the allegedly negative employment effects of job protection regulations (lay-off and dismissal restraints), the West German government in 1985 introduced new legislation facilitating the conclusion of temporary (i.e. fixed-term) work contracts in order to stimulate employment growth (‘Employment Promotion Act 1985‘AZPA). The research unit ‘Labour Market and Employment‘ at the WZB has evaluated the employment and labour market impact of the new legislation for the period 1985-1988, and apart from providing a detailed analysis of the socio-economic and institutional diversity of job arrangements covered by the category of temporary (i.e. fixed-term) employment, the project‘s focus has been on the impact of minor changes in the institutional frame- work as effected by the EPA on firms‘ employment policies, as well as on the overall level of employment. Results show that like in most other European countries the temporary work force in Germany has considerably grown over the past years in both absolute and relative terms, this increase, however, being largely due to cyclical factors as well as medium-term structural changes on the supply and demand side of the labour market rather than to changes in the regulatory framework as effected by the EPA. The impact of the new regulations on firms‘ hiring decisions and on the overall number of hirings in the total economy have to be regarded as rather modest, in fact amounting to not more than an estimated 25,000 additional hires per year or roughly 0.5|X% of all employment contracts concluded in the private sector. This marginal positive impact on firms‘ employment decisions, however, is counterbalanced by unintended substitution effects and an increase in involuntary quits arising from them when labour demand declines. Even under the overall positive employment development given in the period under investigation the net employment effects of the EPA temporary work legislation thus are shown to be at best marginal. In case of a deterioration of the overall economic situation, however, the increase in temporary job arrangements supported by the new legislation is likely to lead to accelerated workforce adjustments by firms and thus over time to result in a depression of the overall level of employment. From a theoretical point of view, the findings suggest that measures aiming at de-regulating labour relations such as the EPA largely fail to modify essential behavioral parameters of economic actors in economic environments which for decades have adjusted to a relatively high level of welfare state regulation, as has been the case in Western Germany.     

Continuity of f-projections and applications to the iterative proportional fitting procedure*

This paper proves continuity of f-projections and the continuous dependence of the limit matrix of the iterative proportional fitting procedure (IPF procedure) on the given matrix as well as the given marginals under certain regularity constraints. For finite spaces, the concept of f-projections of finite measures on a compact and convex set is introduced and continuity of f-projections is proven. This result is applied to the IPF procedure. Given a nonnegative matrix as well as row and column marginals the IPF procedure generates a sequence of matrices, called the IPF sequence, by alternately fitting rows and columns to match their respective marginals. The procedure is equivalent to cyclic f-projections. If the IPF sequence converges, the application of the continuity of f-projections yields the continuous dependence of the limit matrix on the given matrix. By generalized convex programming and under some constraints, it is shown that the limit matrix of the IPF sequence continuously depends not only on the given matrix but also on the marginals.     

The surprising effectiveness of earliest operation due-date sequencing

In make-to order production, schedule reliability is very important but still not sufficiently accomplished in industrial practice by the vast majority of companies. It has been known for long that processing the orders at a workstation in the order of their operation due-dates can compensate for lateness in the arrival at the workstation within certain boundaries. The paper analyses the effectiveness of earliest operation due date (EODD) sequencing by comparing it to an optimistic theoretical boundary. The surprising result is that EODD can nearly fully exploit the theoretical potential. It should therefore be used in practice whenever schedule reliability is important, with only few exceptions. Its effectiveness though is increasing with the workstation’s WIP level and thus is in conflict with the objective to reduce WIP levels and throughput times. A simple forecasting model allows to assess the extent to which lateness can be compensated by EODD sequencing and which schedule compliance can be achieved.