Abstract:The education variable in the IAB employment subsample has two shortcomings: missing values and inconsistencies with the reporting rule. We propose several deductive imputation procedures to improve the variable. They mainly use the multiple education information available in the data because the employees' education is reported at least once a year. We compare the improved data from the different procedures and the original data in typical applications in labor economics: educational composition of employment and wage inequality. We find, that correcting the education variable shows the educational attainment of the male labor force to be higher than measured with the original data and changes some estimates of wage inequality. Our analysis does not provide a definite rule on how to choose among the different imputation procedures discussed, but we recommend correcting the original education variable. Keywords: Imputation Rules, Data problems, Education, Administrative Data, IAB employment subsample * Goethe University Frankfurt, ZEW, IZA, IFS. Address: Department of Economics, Goethe-University, PO Box 11 19 32 (PF 247), 60054 Frankfurt am Main, Germany. Email: fitzenberger@wiwi.uni-frankfurt.de † Goethe University Frankfurt. E-mail: osikominu@wiwi.uni-frankfurt.de ‡ Goethe University Frankfurt, CDSEM Universität Mannheim. E-mail: voelter@wiwi.uni-frankfurt.de. This paper benefitted from the helpful comments by two anonymous referees. We gratefully acknowledge financial support by the Institut für Arbeitsmarkt-und Berufsforschung (IAB) through the research projects "Über die Wirksamkeit von FuU-Maßnahmen -Ein Evaluationsversuch mit prozessproduzierten Daten aus dem IAB (IAB project number 6-531A)" und "Die Beschäftigungswirkung der FbW-Maßnahmen 2000-2002 auf individueller Ebene -Eine Evaluation auf Basis der integrierten aufbereiteten IAB-Individualdatenbasis" (IAB project number 6-531.1A). We thank Stefan Bender, Michael Lechner, Ruth Miquel, Stefan Speckesser, and Conny Wunsch for very helpful discussions. All errors are our sole responsibility.

As the first, substantive contribution, this paper revisits the effectiveness of two widely used public sponsored training programs, the first one focusing on intensive occupational training and the second one on short-term activation and job entry. We use an exceptionally rich administrative data set for Germany to estimate their employment and earnings effects in the early 2000s. We employ a stratified propensity score matching approach to address dynamic selection into heterogeneous programs. As a second, methodological contribution, we carefully assess to what extent various aspects of our empirical strategy such as conditioning flexibly on employment and benefit histories, the availability of rich personal information, handling of later program participations, and further methodological and specification choices affect estimation results. Our results imply pronounced negative lock-in effects in the short run in general and positive medium-run effects on employment and earnings when job-seekers enroll after having been unemployed for some time.We find that data and specification issues can have a large effect on impact estimates.

This article investigates how precisely short-term, job search-oriented training programs as opposed to long-term, human capital intensive training programs work. We evaluate and compare their effects on time until job entry, stability of employment, and earnings. Further, we examine the heterogeneity of treatment effects according to the timing of training during unemployment as well as across different subgroups of participants. We find that participating in short-term training reduces the remaining time in unemployment and moderately increases job stability. Long-term training programs initially prolong the remaining time in unemployment, but once the scheduled program end is reached participants exit to employment at a much faster rate than without training. In addition, they benefit from substantially more stable employment spells and higher earnings. Overall, long-term training programs are well effective in supporting the occupational advancement of very heterogeneous groups of participants, including those with generally weak labor market prospects. However, from a fiscal perspective only the low-cost shortterm training schemes are cost efficient in the short run.

As the first, substantive contribution, this paper revisits the effectiveness of two widely used public sponsored training programs, the first one focusing on intensive occupational training and the second one on short-term activation and job entry. We use an exceptionally rich administrative data set for Germany to estimate their employment and earnings effects in the early 2000s. We employ a stratified propensity score matching approach to address dynamic selection into heterogeneous programs. As a second, methodological contribution, we carefully assess to what extent various aspects of our empirical strategy such as conditioning flexibly on employment and benefit histories, the availability of rich personal information, handling of later program participations, and further methodological and specification choices affect estimation results. Our results imply pronounced negative lock-in effects in the short run in general and positive medium-run effects on employment and earnings when job-seekers enroll after having been unemployed for some time.We find that data and specification issues can have a large effect on impact estimates.