The use of atypical forms of employment in Baden-Württemberg

Since the last 10 to 15 years, companies widely use atypical forms of employment (in particular fixed-term contract work, temporary agency work as well as minor employment) as a short-term and flexible strategy for personnel recruitment. This particular development became subject to a controversial public debate. On the one hand, these forms of employment enable companies to adapt their employments levels to their actual capacity. On the other hand, there is the risk that "regular" work relationships are replaced with "fragile" work relationships leading to a long-term segmentation of the labour market. In the light of the above, the aim of the project is to reveal the development of atypical forms of employment at the current margin as well as in comparison over time.

The investigation can be divided into four parts.

• Part 1 analyses the structure of atypical work. In particular, this part highlights its relation to labor market issues. That is, the part focuses on the connection between atypical forms of employment and work conditions.
• Part 2 examines the temporal development of temporary work regarding its expansion, the effects of minimum wage regulations, and the impact of the economic crisis.
• Part 3 analyses more closely the question whether fixed-term contract work replaces regular employment.
• Part 4 studies determinants which indicate when temporary work relationships are transformed into regular employments.

Data basis is the IAB panel data set. The IAB panel data set exist since 1993 in West-Germany and since 1996 in East-Germany and allows a profound analysis of labor demand behavior at the individual company’s level. Since 2000, the amount of interviewed companies in Baden-Württemberg increased to 1200 enterprises allowing a representative country-specific structural analysis of activities in the labor market.

The Final Report (in German) can be downloaded from [here].

The Management Summary (in German) can be downloaded from [here].