Wolfgang Frimmel

Johannes Kepler University of Linz | JKU · Institute of Economics

We analyze how a worker's severe health shock affects the employment and health behavior of their older coworkers. We link comprehensive administrative data on labor market histories and health records from Austria to identify coworker networks and severe health shocks in small firms, which cause substantial increases in healthcare expenditures, ab...

The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic had an enormous impact on social and economic life and in particular. for human health care. In this paper, we document the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and its accompanying policies on individual health care utilization. We use detailed administrative health registry data for Upper Austria for the years 201...

This paper studies the impact of raising the eligibility age of early retirement on the reintegration into the labor market of elderly unemployed workers. I exploit two Austrian pension reforms increasing the early retirement age step-wise for different quarter-of-birth cohorts. Empirical results based on Austrian administrative data reveal a subst...

This paper studies the impact of raising the eligibility age of early retirement on the reintegration into the labor market of elderly unemployed workers. I exploit two Austrian pension reforms increasing the early retirement age step-wise for different quarter-of-birth cohorts. Empirical results based on Austrian administrative data reveal a subst...

Pension systems and reforms thereof are often discussed in the context of financial viability. In industrialized countries, these debates grow in intensity with the aging of the population; however, an increase in the retirement age may create un-intended side effects with regard to retirees' health or healthcare costs. This study empirically analy...

Does tax evasion run in the family? To answer this question, we study the case of the commuter tax allowance in Austria. This allowance is designed as a step function of the distance between the residence and the workplace, creating sharp discontinuities at each bracket threshold. It turns out that the distance to the next higher bracket is a stron...

In general, retirement is seen as a pure labor supply phenomenon, but firms can have strong incentives to send expensive older workers into retirement. Based on considerations about wage costs and replacement costs, we discuss steep seniority wage profiles as incentives for firms to dismiss older workers before retirement. Conditional on individu...

Pension systems and their reforms are often discussed in the context of financial viability. These debates grow in intensity with the aging of the population in industrialized countries. However, an increase in retirement age may create unintended side effects for retirees' health or healthcare costs. This paper empirically analyzes the effect of (...

In general, retirement is seen as a pure labor supply phenomenon, but firms can have strong incentives to send expensive older workers into retirement. Based on the seniority wage model developed by Lazear (1979), we discuss steep seniority wage profiles as incentives for firms to dismiss older workers before retirement. Conditional on individual r...

Policies to promote marriage are controversial, and it is unclear whether they are successful. To analyze such policies, it is essential to distinguish between a marriage that is created by a marriage-promoting policy (marginal marriage) and a marriage that would have been formed even in the absence of a state intervention (average marriage). In th...

In this paper, we study the socio-economic determinants of birth weight, with a focus on the mother's family status. We use Austrian birth register data covering all births between 1984 and 2007 and find that a mother's marriage is associated with a higher birth weight of the newborn, in the range of 40 to 60 g. The significant impact is retained i...

This paper documents that changes in assortative mating patterns over the last four decades along the dimensions of age, ethnicity, religion and education are not responsible for the increasing marital instability. Quite the contrary, without the rise in the age at marriage, divorce rates would be considerably higher. Immigration and secularization...

Policies to promote marriage are controversial. It is essential to distinguish between a marriage which is created by a marriage promoting policy (marginal marriage), and a marriage which would have been formed even in the absence of a state interven-tion (average marriage). In this paper we exploit the suspension of a cash-on hand marriage subsidy...