Lifetime Earnings Inequality in Germany

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Boenke, Timm; Corneo, Giacomo; Luethen, Holger
• 署名单位: Free University of Berlin; Free University of Berlin; IZA Institute Labor Economics; Leibniz Association; Ifo Institut; Free University of Berlin; Leibniz Association; DIW Berlin - Deutsches Institut fur Wirtschaftsforschung
• 刊物名称: JOURNAL OF LABOR ECONOMICS
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0734-306X
• DOI: 10.1086/677559
• 发表日期: 2015
• 页码: 171-208
• 关键词: rising wage inequality; UNITED-STATES; income inequality; mobility; unemployment; polarization

摘要

We employ German social security records to investigate intragenerational lifetime earnings inequality and mobility of yearly earnings for 35 cohorts, starting with the birth year 1935. Our main result is a striking secular rise of intragenerational inequality in lifetime earnings: West German men born in the early 1960s are likely to experience about 85% more lifetime inequality than their fathers. In contrast, both short-term and long-term intragenerational mobility are stable. Longer unemployment spells of workers at the bottom of the distribution of younger cohorts contribute to explaining 20%-40% of the overall increase in lifetime earnings inequality.