THE ROLE OF INFORMATION ON RETIREMENT PLANNING: EVIDENCE FROM A FIELD STUDY

Many households neglect the pivotal task of planning for retirement. Proposals to stimulate employees to save for retirement in the workplace include tax subsidies, which are costly, and using automatic defaults, which may not complement the heterogeneous preferences of savers. This randomized field study shows that an information‐based intervention increases reported retirement plan participation, emergency savings, and using a budget. Employees offered access to education increased actual retirement deferrals by $26 per month. These results suggest that retirement education programs may be an effective strategy to increase retirement planning and saving behavior. (JEL J26, D14, D91)     

Did UEFA’s financial fair play harm competition in European football leagues?

Review of Managerial Science - When introducing UEFA’s Financial Fair Play (FFP) it was argued that as a beneficial side effect competition in European football leagues should become more...     

Factors Shaping Workplace Segregation Between Natives and Immigrants

Research on segregation of immigrant groups is increasingly turning its attention from residential areas toward other important places, such as the workplace, where immigrants can meet and interact with members of the native population. This article examines workplace segregation of immigrants. We use longitudinal, georeferenced Swedish population register data, which enables us to observe all immigrants in Sweden for the period 1990–2005 on an annual basis. We compare estimates from ordinary least squares with fixed-effects regressions to quantify the extent of immigrants’ self-selection into specific workplaces, neighborhoods, and partnerships, which may bias more naïve ordinary least squares results. In line with previous research, we find lower levels of workplace segregation than residential segregation. The main finding is that low levels of residential segregation reduce workplace segregation, even after we take into account intermarriage with natives as well as unobserved characteristics of immigrants’ such as willingness and ability to integrate into the host society. Being intermarried with a native reduces workplace segregation for immigrant men but not for immigrant women.     

山西省城镇收入现状研究

由传统的计划经济体制向社会主义市场经济体制转轨时期,山西省城镇居民与全国人民一样,个人收入水平有了很大提高,收入分配格局发生了显著变化,但是人们更关心和注目的是山西城镇居民收入结构和原因,以及它们对山西经济的发展、对经济体制的稳定转轨的影响。本文着重考查分析与全国相比山西城镇居民收入差距的现状及其发展态势。     

Perceptions of Migration and Diversity by Local Public Administrators

This article contributes to the recent debate on the perception of migration and diversity; it empirically examines whether public decision-makers and public administrators perceive migration and diversity as related or if they distinguish between them. It also seeks to identify the most important characteristics of respondents with positive attitudes to migration and diversity. The sample of the respondents covers Turkey, Greece, Hungary and Slovakia; those located on the “Balkan migration route” into Europe. Due to different experiences, respondents from countries with large-scale migration perceive migration and diversity differently from those in countries directly threatened by migration or countries without any direct impact of migration. Gender appears to be a statistically significant predictor in the need for high managerial skills to manage migration and diversity. Some size categories of municipalities where a respondent works appear to be statistically significant when ranking the local impacts and local economic benefits of migration.     

Sozialstrukturelle Interessenlagen und Parteipräferenz in Deutschland

Based on Allbus data, stability and change of the impact of social structurally defined interests on party preference in Germany is investigated. We use both traditional cleavage indicators like union membership or frequency of church attendance and further social structural characteristics like class identification, occupation or unemployment experience. We apply a two-level model with varying intercepts for the 16 Allbus surveys from 1980 to 2008. Beyond the expected results we observe some deviations from the stable relationship between social structural variables and party preference. (1) The younger generation of active Catholics prefers the Christian Democrats less than the older cohorts and the East German working class leaned towards this party immediately after unification. (2) Union members got alienated from the Social Democrats since 2004 due to reforms of unemployment benefits for people being out of work for a longer period of time with the consequence that Die Linke could profit from this trend in West and East Germany. (3) This left socialist party and its forerunner, the PDS, has always been the preferred party of people with unemployment experience. (4) The Greens and the Liberal Party are enduringly supported by specific social groups, the Greens by the social and cultural service class and the FDP by the self-employed, at least since this latter party ended the social liberal coalition with the SPD in 1982.     

Implementation of evidence-based interventions: analyzing critical components for sustainability in community mental health services

This study analyses the implementation and sustainability of evidence-based community mental health services in the form of publicly financed Individual Placement and Support programs. Critical implementation components and program fidelity were assessed after one year. After two years, program fidelity was assessed once again. After three years, the programs’ sustainability was assessed and semi-structured interviews performed, in order to deepen the understanding of implementation. Interviews and documents provided the quantitative and qualitative data, which were analyzed by the use of the Supported Employment Fidelity Scale, the Sustainable Implementation Scale (which was developed in a connecting study), and qualitative content analysis. Despite promising fidelity results after one year, eight out of 14 programs were terminated within three years. Implementation of integrated evidence-based programs in community-based settings is a delicate undertaking. Implementing agencies can benefit from rigorous preparation before program start, especially concerning the circumstances at the organizational level, such as making plans for collaboration, financing and assessments of program fidelity.     

Training professionalisation and SME performance

ABSTRACT

This paper examines how SMEs organize their training process, the extent to which they apply training practices that are well-grounded in literature, and how these impact upon their performance. To evaluate the training process, the concept of ‘training professionalization’ was applied to identify the scope and specificity of actions undertaken. This mostly refers to formal training which should consist of needs assessment, planning, execution and evaluation. This article presents the results of research conducted on a group of 100 Polish SMEs. The research design made it possible to evaluate training professionalization and verify interdependence between training professionalization level and business outcomes. Data analysis confirmed that the training process in SMEs is generally underdeveloped; only in a few companies is it executed according to the models and procedures discussed in the literature. However, it was statistically supported that companies executing training processes according to theoretical models reported higher outcomes and an increase in almost all evaluated performance indicators.     

ON THE HETEROGENEOUS EMPLOYMENT EFFECTS OF OFFSHORING: IDENTIFYING PRODUCTIVITY AND DOWNSIZING CHANNELS

This article examines the channels through which offshoring affects employment in a representative sample of German establishments, using a difference‐in‐differences matching approach. Offshoring is measured by an increase in the share of foreign to total intermediate inputs at the plant‐level. We identify a positive productivity effect and isolate a negative downsizing effect from offshoring on employment, by exploiting differences between offshoring plants that do and do not simultaneously restructure. Furthermore, we cannot find evidence of negative indirect employment effects on domestic suppliers or competitors. (JEL F16, J23, F23, C21)     

Antwortlatenzzeiten in der survey-basierten Verhaltensforschung

The article reports about an empirical investigation on three moderator hypotheses claiming that the mode of information processing acts as a moderator for all effects specified by the “theory of reasoned action” (TRA) to explain behavioural intentions and actual behaviour. Our empirical research uses data of a 2005 German nationwide CATI-survey. When analyzing this data by estimating structural equation models we could detect the moderating function of response latencies. All the effects of behavioural attitudes and behavioural intentions specified by the TRA were moderated significantly when the model was used to explain intended and actual money donations. However, the TRA-effect of subjective norms was not infected by the mode of information processing. Our results show that classical models of attitude-behaviour research (e.g. TRA-model) can be improved theoretically and empirically by concepts developed in process models of attitude research (e.g. MODE-model).