Browsing by Subject "Temporary employment"

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    Die Intensität der Leiharbeitsnutzung in Deutschland. Eine empirische Analyse von betrieblichen Determinanten
    (2013) Schröpfer, Stefanie; Wagenhals, Gerhard
    Since the legal basis of temporary agency work has been relaxed in the context of the Hartz reforms in 2003/2004, firms use of temporary work has come under severe criticism: Firms are accused of using temporary work not only for flexibility reasons, but also to reduce costs strategically. As a result, permanent employees would be replaced by temporary workers. The use of temporary work as a strategic instrument has only been confirmed by qualitative studies so far. In particular, these studies show that a persistently intensive use aims at reducing the current personnel costs and avoiding costs of institutional arrangements arising from permanent but not from temporary employees. Given the increasing number of temporary workers in German firms, microeconometric studies have investigated the impact of high shares of temporary employees on firms’ performance. However, up to now, there is no quantitative evidence to what extent firms demand for temporary work can be explained by motives of strategic use. This thesis empirically examines the quantitative relevance of firms motives to use temporary work strategically with regard to the intensity of use. More specifically, this thesis addresses two main questions: First, what is the impact of the strategic motives of firms on the scale of employing temporary workers? Second, to what extent has the relevance of specific strategic motives changed after the deregulation of the temporary employment industry? To this end, this study draws on data from the Establishment Panel of the Institute for Employment Research (IAB) to analyse firms demand on temporary work using microeconometric methods, which are predominantly applied for the first time in this context. In a nutshell, the estimation results indicate that temporary work as a strategic instrument for cutting costs has become more important after the deregulation of the temporary employment industry. There is strong evidence that firms use temporary work more intensively and also persistently intensive to reduce their current personnel costs particularly in the low-skill sector. In addition, firms apparently use temporary work to avoid potential lay-off costs since the deregulation took place. While the results further suggest that firms try to strengthen their competitiveness by using temporary work, there are no clear signs for circumventing costs arising from collective agreements.