Suchergebnisse

This paper compares life satisfaction among the elderly (61 years of age or older) who are self-employed, wage-employed or out of the labour force in Sweden with the help of a unique survey. Sweden is interesting since the share of elderly, just as in other countries, has increased during the last decade. Encouraging the elderly to remain in the labour force is now high on the political agenda. We find that people who are self-employed report higher life satisfaction than people who are wage-employed or out of the labour force.General health is a strong determinant of life satisfaction but the differences among the groups remain when we control for health related variables. Further, the self-employed report higher job satisfaction than the wage-employed, and find their work less mentally straining or stressful. Even though our results are driven by different types of selection, we conclude that they underline the need for a flexible working life. Stimulating self-employment among older people may be an effective way to improve their life satisfaction, to increase Sweden's labour supply and to keep older people in the labour force.

This paper compares life satisfaction among the elderly (61 years of age or older) who are self-employed, wage-employed or out of the labour force in Sweden with the help of a unique survey. Sweden is interesting since the share of elderly, just as in other countries, has increased during the last decade. Encouraging the elderly to remain in the labour force is now high on the political agenda. We find that people who are self-employed report higher life satisfaction than people who are wage-employed or out of the labour force. General health is a strong determinant of life satisfaction but the differences among the groups remain when we control for health related variables. Further, the self-employed report higher job satisfaction than the wage-employed, and find their work less mentally stressful. Even though our results are driven by different types of selection, we conclude that they underline the need for a flexible working life. Stimulating self-employment among older people may be an effective way to improve their life satisfaction, to increase Sweden's labour supply and to keep older people in the labour force.

SummaryWe present results from a unique combination of survey and register data regarding access to financial capital conducted among immigrants who are self‐employed in private firms in Sweden's retail, trade, and service sectors. This study is the first to examine discrimination against self‐employed immigrants in the credit market of a developed economy outside the US. The results demonstrate that non‐European immigrants consider access to financial capital a more serious impediment to their self‐employment activities than do native Swedes and European immigrants. Self‐employed non‐European immigrants report more discrimination by banks, suppliers, and customers than do natives and immigrants from European countries. Immigrant‐owned firms apply for bank loans to a larger extent than do firms owned by natives. Non‐European immigrants especially are more likely than natives to have a loan denied, and they are also charged higher interest rates on their bank loans than natives. The results are robust to various different robustness checks. The occurrence of ethnic discrimination in the market for bank loans is put forward as an explanation for these results. Limited or lack of access to financial capital is a major obstacle to self‐employment among certain immigrant groups. This obstacle may be one explanation for the high exit rates from self‐employment among immigrants, a finding that has been documented in several countries including Sweden.

This is an analysis of refugee immigration and public sector finances in Sweden. All refugees who were listed in the national population registers from 2005 to 2007 are tracked from 2006 to 2012. We present two measures of the public sector's net costs related to refugee immigration. In the first measure, public revenues are related to all public costs associated with refugee immigration. The second measure relates public revenues to public costs associated with immigration, excluding costs that can be assumed to be fixed in the short run when refugee immigration increases. By presenting these two measures we are able to present an upper and a lower bound for the public net costs of refugee immigration during a refugee´s first years in Sweden. Our results reveal that during a refugee's first year of residency in Sweden after the asylum application has been approved, the public sector net costs for that refugee's immigration are between 95,000 SEK and 190,000 SEK, depending on how public costs are allocated to the refugee population. After seven years in Sweden, the cost for that refugee is between 37,000 SEK and 125,000 SEK. Large differences are found between refugees with different educational attainment as regards the extent to which they incur a cost for the public sector's finances. ; The results in this paper are based upon a report written for the Swedish Fiscal Policy Council by Aldén and Hammarstedt (2016), "Flyktinginvandring – sysselsättning, förvärvsinkomster och offentliga finanser", Studier i finanspolitik, 2016:1. The authors are grateful for comments from members of the Swedish Fiscal Policy Council and from Bertil Holmlund and Joakim Sonnegård. The authors are also grateful for discussions with Spencer Bastani and Jan Ekberg.

AbstractWe present results from a unique nationwide survey conducted in Sweden on sexual orientation and job satisfaction. Our results show that gay men are more likely to be very satisfied with their job than heterosexual men, both in general and with different aspects of the job. In contrast, lesbians appear less satisfied with their job in general and with promotion prospects than heterosexual women. Among women, we find no differences in the probability of being very satisfied with the job by sexual orientation. However, the issue of sexual orientation and job satisfaction is complex since gay men, despite that they more often are very satisfied with the job, like lesbians find their job more mentally straining than heterosexuals. We conclude that gay men and lesbians are facing other stressers at work than heterosexuals do. We also conclude that the worker's own expectations about the job and possibilities to fulfill career plans may be possible driving forces to our results. Previous research has documented discrimination against gay males and lesbians in hiring. Our results underline that measures to prevent discrimination in hiring is not enough to create an equal working life for homosexuals and heterosexuals. Measures within the workplace are also needed.

We study tipping behavior in residential mobility of the native population in Sweden between 1990 and 2007. Using regression discontinuity methods, we find that the native population growth in a neighborhood discontinuously drops once the share of non-European immigrants exceeds the identified tipping point. Native tipping behavior can be ascribed to both native flight and native avoidance. Natives with a high level of educational attainment and the highest labor earnings are more likely to move from neighborhoods that have tipped. We conclude that tipping behavior is likely to be associated with ethnic as well as to socio-economic segregation in Sweden.

Researchers as well as policymakers often view self-employment as an important factor behind innovation and economic growth and policies that foster self-employment has been on the agenda in several European countries during the last decades. The Jack-of-all-trades theory argues that individuals with a balanced set of skills are more suitable for self-employment than others. In this paper we test this theory using Swedish Military Enlistment data. This data enables us to construct a measure of balance in endowed abilities that, incomparison to measures used in previous research, is less contaminated by endogeneity problems. Specifically, we measure balance in skills using the result from the tests of cognitive and non-cognitive ability taken at military enlistment. We find clear support for the Jack-of-all-trades theory, in the sense that the likelihood of being self-employed or switching into self-employment is higher for individuals who are more balanced in their in abilities. In addition, earnings from self-employment tend to be higher among individuals with a more balanced set of skills.

"An experimental study of perceptions about gay, lesbian, and heterosexual domestic violence in Sweden. Undergraduate students (N=1.009) read one of eight fictitious scenarios of domestic violence in married couple relationships, where sexual orientation, sex of victim and batterer, and severity of violence were varied. Perceptions of seriousness of the described incident and attitudes toward women, gays and lesbians were measured. Domestic violence was perceived as more serious in cases where: the respondent was a woman, the batterer was a man, the victim was a woman, or the battering was severe. Wife-battering in a heterosexual relationship was considered the most serious case in both the less and more severe battering scenario. Where battering was less severe, domestic violence in gay and lesbian relationships was perceived as more serious than heterosexual husband-battering; this difference disappeared in the severe battering scenario. Negative attitudes toward gays, lesbians, and women were associated with less concern about domestic violence in all types of relationships. The findings suggest that stereotypes about gays, lesbians, and women affect perceptions of domestic violence, but mainly when violence is less severe." (author's abstract).

"An experimental study of perceptions about gay, lesbian, and heterosexual domestic violence in Sweden. Undergraduate students (N=1.009) read one of eight fictitious scenarios of domestic violence in married couple relationships, where sexual orientation, sex of victim and batterer, and severity of violence were varied. Perceptions of seriousness of the described incident and attitudes toward women, gays and lesbians were measured. Domestic violence was perceived as more serious in cases where: the respondent was a woman, the batterer was a man, the victim was a woman, or the battering was severe. Wife-battering in a heterosexual relationship was considered the most serious case in both the less and more severe battering scenario. Where battering was less severe, domestic violence in gay and lesbian relationships was perceived as more serious than heterosexual husband-battering; this difference disappeared in the severe battering scenario. Negative attitudes toward gays, lesbians, and women were associated with less concern about domestic violence in all types of relationships. The findings suggest that stereotypes about gays, lesbians, and women affect perceptions of domestic violence, but mainly when violence is less severe." (author's abstract)