Later One Knows Better: The Over-Reporting of Short-Time Work in Firm Surveys

Christian Kagerl, Malte Schierholz and Bernd Fitzenberger
Additional contact information
Malte Schierholz: LMU
Bernd Fitzenberger: Institute for Employment Research (IAB), Nuremberg, Germany ; FAU ; IFS ; CESifo ; IZA ; ROA

No 202212, IAB-Discussion Paper from Institut für Arbeitsmarkt- und Berufsforschung (IAB), Nürnberg [Institute for Employment Research, Nuremberg, Germany]

Abstract: "Short-time work (STW) in Germany allows for a lot of flexibility in actual usage. Ex ante, firms notify the Federal Employment Agency about the total number of employees eligible, and, up to the total granted, firms can flexibly choose how many employees actually use STW. In firm-level surveys, which provide timely information on STW in Germany, over-reporting of the number of employees on STW is prevalent. This study explores reasons for STW over-reporting based on a high-frequency and low-cost survey initiated during the Covid19 pandemic (BeCovid) and a low-frequency and high-cost long-running survey (BP). Merging administrative records on actual use of STW, firms that use STW prove more likely to participate in the BeCovid survey. Multiestablishment firms overreport STW because they tend to report STW for all subfirms. The BP uses more interview time and confirms the over-reporting of STW use in the survey month, while – crucially – the over-reporting drops sharply with a few months of retrospection." (Author's abstract, IAB-Doku) ((en))

Keywords: Bundesrepublik Deutschland; Pandemie; IAB-Datensatz BeCovid; IAB-Open-Access-Publikation; Datenqualität; Messfehler; IAB-Betriebspanel; Inanspruchnahme; Non Response; Krisenmanagement; Kurzarbeit; Kurzarbeitergeld; Antwortverhalten; Quote; Schätzung; 2020-2021 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C83 J63 J65 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 37 pages
Date: 2022-05-27
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-dem and nep-lab
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Published in/as: Journal for Labour Market Research, doi:10.1186/s12651-022-00312-9

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.48720/IAB.DP.2212

Related works:
Journal Article: Later one knows better: the over-reporting of short-time work in firm surveys (2022)
Journal Article: Later one knows better: the over-reporting of short-time work in firm surveys (2022)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:iab:iabdpa:202212

DOI: 10.48720/IAB.DP.2212

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in IAB-Discussion Paper from Institut für Arbeitsmarkt- und Berufsforschung (IAB), Nürnberg [Institute for Employment Research, Nuremberg, Germany] Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by IAB, Geschäftsbereich Wissenschaftliche Fachinformation und Bibliothek ().