‘Marginal Employment’ and the Demand for Heterogenous Labour: Empirical Evidence from a Multi-Factor Labour Demand Model for Germany

Ronny Freier () and Viktor Steiner ()
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Ronny Freier: DIW Berlin
Viktor Steiner: Free University of Berlin

No 2577, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: We develop a structural multi-factor labour demand model which distinguishes between eight labour categories including non-standard types of employment such as marginal employment. The model is estimated for both the number of workers and total working hours using a new panel data set. For unskilled and skilled workers in full-time employment, we find labour demand elasticities similar to previous estimates for the west German economy. Our new estimates of own-wage elasticities for marginal employment range between -.4 (number of male workers in west Germany) to -1 (working hours for women). We illustrate the implications of these estimates by simulating the likely labour demand effects of the recent increase of employers’ social security contributions (SSC) on marginal employment in Germany.

Keywords: multi-factor labour demand for heterogenous labour; marginal employment (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C51 J21 J23 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 29 pages
Date: 2007-01
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-lab
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (10)

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