Thomas Leoni

Characteristics of self-employment among university graduates

In this article, we investigate the characteristics of nonagricultural self-employment (SE) among university graduates in Austria. Probit regressions based on 380 000 observations from the countrys 2001 population census indicate that the probability of choosing SE rises significantly with age. We find that men are more likely to be entrepreneurs than women. There are also strong sectoral and regional effects, such as higher probabilities in rural areas. Furthermore, we observe a significant link between the propensity to be self-employed and the type of university degree. Our findings concerning the relationship between citizenship and SE indicate that highly-skilled immigrants from low-wage countries are less likely to be entrepreneurs than native-born citizens and graduates from high-wage countries.

Regional Female Labour Force Participation: An Empirical Application with Spatial Effects

The female labour force participation rate (LFPR) displays a high degree of variation across regions. Our paper contributes to an understanding of regional determinants of female labour supply by looking at Austria’s 121 political districts. As predicted by theory, the aggregate wage level has a positive impact on female LFPRs. We also find that a decrease in the gender wage gap increases the female participation ratio. Population density is positively associated with the female participation rate. This indicates that densely populated areas provide a larger and better array of employment opportunities for female workers. Furthermore, child-care provision for young children is significant and positive. Our model, based on a reduced-form equation, is tested for robustness using various specifications and extended with a spatial econometrics approach. We find that estimated relationships between traditional regional labour supply determinants are sensitive to the inclusion of spatial effects. The spatial parameter is negative, indicating that regions with high participation levels are surrounded by areas with significantly lower participation levels.

Sickness and disability policies: Reform paths in OECD countries between 1990 and 2014

We analysed sickness and disability policies for the working-age population in a number of OECD countries, between the years 1990 and 2014. Existing evidence suggests that there has been a broad shift in focus from passive income maintenance to employment incentives and reintegration policies. We have updated detailed policy scores provided by the OECD to estimate model-based country clusters. Our results indicate that countries have pursued different types of reforms consisting of a combination of integration and compensation measures. The reforms of recent decades have led to the emergence of a distinct cluster of Northern and Continental European countries characterised by a combination of strong employment-oriented policies and comparatively high social protection levels. An analysis of recent reforms shows a continued expansion of measures that foster employment as well as instances of retrenchment in the compensation dimension. Diversity of policy settings across country groups, however, remains substantial.

Reforming Welfare States

This report collects and draws conclusions from research papers of Area 1. It summarises the results against the background of the existing literature, focusing in particular on the challenges arising on welfare states from globalisation, post-industrialisation, and demographic changes. The report also discusses problems of the political economy of policy reform and large-scale economic and social transitions.