As part of the ULME seminar,Ms Lisa Windsteiger (University of Salzburg) will be presenting her paper

on 12 November 2026 from 4.15 pm to 5.30 pm 

at Helmholtzstrasse 18, Room 1.20

Topic: “When (Declaring) Work Doesn’t Pay: An Experiment with Welfare Recipients”.

Ms Windsteiger will be present that afternoon both before and after the lecture. There is an option to join her for dinner. If you are interested, please contact Ms Sandra Ludwig (sandra.ludwig(at)uni-ulm.de)

Abstract:

We study how marginal effective tax rates generated by means-tested social welfare programmes affect labour supply in the formal and informal sectors. In a conjoint experiment, German welfare recipients report which jobs they might accept under different policy scenarios, varied in a between-subjects treatment design. We find that high benefit withdrawal rates negatively affect labour supply in the formal sector and thus increase the relative attractiveness of informal work. These results provide novel evidence on the adverse implications of high benefit withdrawal rates and highlight the need for reform initiatives aimed at increasing incentives for labour supply.