Thomas Walter 
Germany’s 2005 Welfare Reform 
Evaluating Key Characteristics with a Focus on Immigrants

In January 2005, the German government enacted a substantial reform of the welfare system, the so-called “Hartz IV reform”. This book evaluates key characteristics of the reform from a microeconometric perspective. It investigates whether a centralized or decentralized organization of welfare administration is more successful to integrate welfare recipients into employment. Moreover, it analyzes the employment effects of an intensified use of benefit sanctions and evaluates the effectiveness and efficiency of the most frequently assigned Active Labor Market Programs. The analyses have a focus on immigrants, who are highly over-represented in the German welfare system.​

Table of Content

Introduction.- Background for the Empirical Analyses: Institutional Details and Data.- Centralized versus Decentralized Welfare Administration.- The Employment Effects of an Intensified Use of Benefit Sanctions.- The Effectiveness of Temporary Extra Jobs and Short-Term Training Programs.- Fiscal Cost-Benefit Analyses for Temporary Extra Jobs and Short-Term Training Programs.- Conclusions.- Appendices.

About the author

Thomas Walter studied Economics at the University of Hannover and at the University of Bristol with special emphasis on economic policy, labour economics and econometrics. He works at the Centre for European Economic Research (ZEW) in Mannheim as a researcher in the department of ‘Labour Markets, Human Resources and Social Policy’. His research focuses on the labour market activation of welfare recipients.