The impact of wages on job search in a transition economy - evidence with data from Eastern Germany

Empirical Economics - Tập 22 - Trang 41-61 - 1997
Olaf Hübler1
1Institut für Quantitative Wirtschaftsforschung, Universität Hannover, Hannover, Germany

Tóm tắt

This study is concerned with the impact of wages on job search decisions in Eastern Germany immediately after reunification and in later periods. Several concepts measuring wage effects are used. The results of bivariate probit estimates with incomplete classification for a global and local job search show that the wage level had stronger effects on the former than on the latter job search decision directly after the collapse of the Berlin Wall. The degree of satisfaction with current income and the earnings capacities were irrelevant for the search decision. Low-paid East German workers had a higher propensity to search for a new job in the old Länder than others. This is contrary to the misleading result of isolated estimates about the job search in Western Germany. In the subsequent periods the situation has changed. The difference of earnings capacities between Eastern and Western Germany, specific East German wage premiums and intraregional wage inequality affect the decision to search for a new job in the west.

Tài liệu tham khảo

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