Lebenslauf, Vermögen und Alterseinkommen in Ost- und Westdeutschland: Ein Kohorten- und Geschlechtervergleich

The project examines employment and retirement trajectories and their connection with financial resources in the post-employment phase in East and West Germany, including the development of wealth. The aim of the project is to gain insights into gender-specific employment and earnings trajectories in a cohort comparison (birth cohorts <1947, 1947-1956, 1957-1966 and 1967-1976) in East and West Germany and their connection to individual financial security in old age. By analyzing retirement income and wealth, we can draw conclusions about the relationship between individual wealth accumulation and the accumulation of pension entitlements over the life course. The data basis for the empirical analyses is the SOEP-RV dataset, a combination of the administrative data of the German Pension Insurance (Scientific Use Files of the Versicherungskontenstichprobe and the Versichertenrentenbestands) and the Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP). This data basis makes it possible to observe the development of employment and pension entitlements over the life course and to gain a comprehensive picture not only of payment amounts and entitlements under the statutory pension insurance scheme, but also of all other income and wealth components.Our approach is divided into four modules: Module I includes the complex pre-processing of the income and wealth data from the SOEP, the employment and earnings point patterns from the SOEP and the Versichertenkontenstichprobe, and their merging. Module II uses multichannel sequence pattern analysis to analyze gender- and marital status-specific patterns of earnings and earnings points in eastern and western Germany in a cohort comparison and relates these to financial resources in old age. Module III uses a combination of multichannel sequence pattern and cluster analysis to create a typology of employment and earnings trajectories in order to shed light on different strategies and paths of individual retirement provision and their changes in a cohort comparison. Module IV relates the typology of employment and earnings trajectories created in Module III to financial resources in old age, including wealth. Within the framework of multivariate regression analyses, we examine the relationship between career types and their level of income and assets. As a result, a realistic picture of financial resources in old age in Germany can be obtained, which depicts their accumulation from a life course perspective and takes into account different patterns as well as vulnerable groups when comparing cohorts.

Funding

Forschungsnetzwerk Alterssicherung der Deutschen Rentenversicherung