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This study provides evidence on the immediate and long-term effects of parental separation and union dissolution on children’s test scores. We use administrative full population data on parents moving out of the joint home and national school-administered low-stakes test. First, a staggered event-study design finds long-term negative effects on test scores with indications of a dynamic effect increasing by time since separation. Results hold when applying recent innovation in difference-in-differences methods. Further, the decline in test scores originates from the middle of the skill distribution. Second, we demonstrate plausible indications of an immediate negative effect of parental separation on children’s test scores using a regression discontinuity design, with the difference in time between test date and parental separation as the running variable.

We investigate whether accommodating job attributes influence the probability of returning to work three years after a cancer diagnosis. Using a combination of Danish administrative data and a survey carried out among Danish breast, colon, and melanoma skin cancer survivors, we find that the probability of returning to work is significantly and positively correlated with a flexible work schedule during and after cancer treatment. The result is robust when controlling for pre-cancer work experience, job seniority, pre-cancer job dissatisfaction, and post-cancer ability to work. Furthermore, we show that the influence of a flexible schedule varies with respect to cancer survivors’ ability to work, level of education, and type of cancer.

Focusing in particular on upper secondary education, this paper examines whether the relatively high level of expenditure on education in the Nordic countries is matched by high output from the educational sector, both in terms of student enrolment and indicators of output quality in the form of graduation/completion rates and expected earnings after completed education. We use data envelopment analysis (DEA) to compare (benchmark) the Nordic countries with a relevant group of rich OECD countries and calculate input efficiency scores for each country. We estimate a wide range of specifications in order to analyse different aspects of efficiency. In purely quantitative models (where inputs and outputs are expenditure and number of students at different levels of the educational system) and in models where graduation or completion rates are included as indicators of output quality, Finland is the most efficient Nordic country (often fully efficient), whereas Sweden and especially Norway and Denmark are clearly inefficient. However, using PISA test scores as indicators of student input quality in upper secondary education reduces the inefficiencies of these three countries. Also, when expected earnings after completed education are used as an indicator of output quality, all Nordic countries are estimated to be fully efficient (or nearly so).

We conduct an econometric evaluation of a health-promoting programme in primary and lower secondary schools in Denmark. The programme includes health-related measurements of the students, communication of knowledge about health, and support of health-promoting projects for students. Half of the schools in the fourth largest municipality in Denmark were randomly selected into a treatment group implementing the programme, while the remainder served as a control group. We estimate both OLS models using only post-intervention observations and difference in differences (DID) models using also pre-intervention observations. We estimate effects of the initiative on BMI, waist/height ratio, overweight and obesity for the entire sample and by gender and grade. We find no consistent effect of the programme. When we use the entire sample, no estimates are statistically significant at conventional levels, although the point estimates for the effect on BMI, indicating an average reduction in the range of 0.10–0.15 kg/m2, are consistent with the results in a recent Cochrane review evaluating 55 studies of diet and exercise interventions targeting children; and DID estimates which are marginally significant (at the 10% level) indicate that the intervention reduces the risk of obesity by 1% point. Running separate estimations by gender and grade we find a few statistically significant estimates: OLS estimates indicate that the intervention reduces BMI in females in grade 5 by 0.39 kg/m2 and reduces the risk of obesity in females in grade 9 by 2.6% points; DID estimates indicate an increase in waist for females in preschool class by 1.2 cm and an increase in the risk of obesity in grade 9 males by 4% points. However, if we corrected for multiple hypotheses testing these estimates would be insignificant. There is no statistically significant correlation between participation in the programme and the number of other health-promoting projects at the schools.

© 2018 The Authors Previous studies find significant negative effects of cancer on employment, with stronger effects for less-educated workers. We investigate whether the effect of cancer varies by skill requirement in the pre-cancer occupation, whether such heterogeneity can explain educational gradients, and whether cancer is associated with changes in job characteristics for cancer survivors who remain employed four years after the diagnosis. We combine Danish administrative registers with detailed skill requirement data and use individuals without cancer as a control group. Our main findings are the following: the negative effect of cancer on employment is stronger if the pre-cancer occupation requires high levels of manual skills or low levels of cognitive skills; the educational gradient diminishes substantially if we allow the effects of cancer to also depend on pre-cancer skill requirements; and cancer is not associated with occupational mobility, indicating potential for policies that reduce labour market frictions for cancer survivors.

© 2020 The Authors We revisit the causal effect of birthweight. Because variation in birthweight in developed countries primarily stems from variation in gestational age rather than intrauterine growth restriction, we depart from the widely-used twin fixed-effects estimator and employ an instrumental variable – the diagnosis of placenta previa, which provides exogenous variation in gestation length. We find protective effects of additional birthweight against infant mortality and health capital loss, such as cerebral palsy, but in contrast to sibling and twin studies, no strong evidence for non-health long-run outcomes, such as test scores. We also find that short-run birthweight effects have diminished significantly over the decades.

We analyze class-size effects on academic achievement in secondary school in Denmark exploiting an institutional setting where pupils cannot predict class size prior to enrollment, and where post-enrollment responses aimed at affecting realized class size are unlikely. We identify class-size effects combining a regression discontinuity design with control for lagged achievement and school fixed effects. Using administrative registry data, we find statistically significant negative effects of class size on academic achievement.

The literature expects public service motivation (PSM) to affect performance, but most of the existing studies of this relationship use subjective performance data and focus on output rather than outcome. This article investigates the association between PSM and the performance of Danish teachers using an objective outcome measure (the students’ academic performance in their final examinations). Combining survey data and administrative register data in a multilevel data set, we are able to control very robustly for the specific characteristics of the students (n = 5,631), the schools (n = 85), and other teacher characteristics (n = 694) besides PSM. We find that PSM is positively associated with examination marks. The result indicates that PSM may be relevant for performance improvements.

We investigate the association between pre-cancer job dissatisfaction and return-to-work probability 3 years after a cancer diagnosis. We use a Danish data set combining administrative data and a survey to breast and colon cancer survivors. We find that the return-to-work probability has a negative correlation with pre-cancer job dissatisfaction with mental demands (where the correlation is driven by the high-educated) and with physical demands and the superior (where the correlation is driven by the low-educated). Educational gradients in the probability of returning to work after cancer are not significantly affected by controlling for pre-cancer job dissatisfaction and pre-cancer ability to work.

We investigate whether job loss as the result of displacement causes hospitalization for stress-related diseases which are widely thought to be associated with unemployment. In doing this, we use much better data than any previous investigators. Our data are a random 10% sample of the male population of Denmark for the years 1981-1999 with full records on demographics, health and work status for each person, and with a link from every working person to a plant. We use the method of 'matching on observables' to estimate the counter-factual of what would have happened to the health of a particular group of displaced workers if they had not in fact been displaced. Our results indicate unequivocally that being displaced in Denmark does not cause hospitalization for stress-related disease. An analysis of the power of our test suggests that even though we are looking for a relatively rare outcome, our data set is large enough to show even quite small an effect if there were any. Supplementary analyses do not show any causal link from displacement or unemployment to our health outcomes for particular groups that might be thought to be more susceptible.

The Danish national return-to-work (RTW) program aims to improve the management of municipal sickness benefit in Denmark. A study is currently ongoing to evaluate the RTW program. The purpose of this article is to describe the study protocol. The program includes 21 municipalities encompassing approximately 19 500 working-age adults on long-term sickness absence, regardless of reason for sickness absence or employment status. It consists of three core elements: (i) establishment of multidisciplinary RTW teams, (ii) introduction of standardized workability assessments and sickness absence management procedures, and (iii) a comprehensive training course for the RTW teams. The effect evaluation is based on a parallel group randomized trial and a stratified cluster controlled trial and focuses on register-based primary outcomes - duration of sickness absence and RTW - and questionnaire-based secondary outcomes such as health and workability. The process evaluation utilizes questionnaires, interviews, and municipal data. The effect evaluation tests whether participants in the intervention have a (i) shorter duration of full-time sickness absence, (ii) longer time until recurrent long-term sickness absence, (iii) faster full RTW, (iv) more positive development in health, workability, pain, and sleep; it also tests whether the program is cost-effective. The process evaluation investigates: (i) whether the expected target population is reached; (ii) if the program is implemented as intended; (iii) how the beneficiaries, the RTW teams, and the external stakeholders experience the program; and (iv) whether contextual factors influenced the implementation. The program has the potential to contribute markedly to lowering human and economic costs and increasing labor force supply. First results will be available in 2013. The trial registrations are ISRCTN43004323, and ISRCTN51445682.

Selection response of parents to low school quality, for instance large class sizes, is a major problem when estimating causal class-size effects, also in experimental and quasi-experimental studies. To address this problem a new identification strategy using within-school variation over time in the size of subject-specific classes is proposed. It provides random class-size variation and enables tests for possible selection using test scores in other subjects. Applying this approach to Danish administrative data, highly significant and substantial positive effects of reducing class size are found on examination marks in French. Effects are larger for academically weak students and for boys.

We analyse the effect of active labour-market programmes on the hazard rate into regular employment for newly arrived immigrants using the timing-of-events duration model. We take account of language course participation and progression in destination country language skills. We use rich administrative data from Denmark. We find substantial lock-in effects of participation in active labour-market programmes. Post programme effects on the hazard rate to regular employment are significantly positive for wage subsidy programmes, but not for other types of programmes. For language course participants, improvement in language proficiency has significant and substantial positive effects on the hazard rate to employment.

To study the degree to which depression indicators based on register data on hospital and antidepressant treatment suffer from differential misclassification with respect to gender, age and social group.Data on 7378 persons were obtained by linking a cross-sectional survey of Danish adults aged 40 and 50 years with population-based registers. Misclassification was analysed by comparing survey data to register data on major depression using the method proposed by Rothman and Greenland.Differential misclassification was found. Adjustment for misclassification reduced women's odds ratios from 2.18 to 1.00 for hospital treatment and from 1.70 to 1.10 for antidepressants. For the lower social group, the corresponding odds ratios increased from 1.18 to 3.52, and from 1.35 to 2.32 respectively, whereas odds ratios with respect to age remained almost unchanged.Differential misclassification should be considered when register-based information about hospital and antidepressant treatment are used as depression indicators.

With the considerable changes in population age-profiles, the preventive care of older people is becoming more and more important. We analyse the long-term effect of the provision of home care on the recipient’s ability to perform the activities of daily living (ADLs) and upon aspects of their well-being. Using regression analysis on a set of Danish longitudinal data featuring people aged 67–77 we estimate the effect of home care while controlling for initial health, including initial ADL ability and well-being, along with demographic and socioeconomic conditions. We find no effect of home care on ADL ability in women; results for men, however, indicate a negative association. The provision of home care has an insignificant effect on women’s well-being, but a positive effect for men incapacitated beyond a certain degree. Results indicate a need for supplementary efforts to protect against the disablement process.

We propose a method for computing indicators of the relative success of local authorities at integrating new immigrants in the labour market, taking account of differences in characteristics of immigrants and local labour markets. The indicator for integration success is based on mean duration from date of residence permit to start of an employment spell. We apply this method to a Danish administrative dataset. Correcting for differences in immigrant characteristics and local labour market conditions has an important impact on the estimated ranking of local authorities. We investigate how robust the ranking is with respect to changes in the specification of criteria for integration success and controls.

We propose a method for estimating indicators of the success of local authorities at integrating immigrants in the labour-market. The proportion of time in employment of individuals is used to measure labour-market integration, and we correct for differences in characteristics of immigrants and local labour markets using a two-limit Tobit model. This method is applied to a large administrative micro dataset which contains information on all immigrants in Denmark. We compare the estimated indicators of integration to corresponding uncorrected measures, and conclude that the corrections have a significant effect on the ranking of local authorities.

We employ a regression-discontinuity design to identify effects on educational attainment after compulsory school of class size and the number of pupils per weekly teacher hour using administrative rules as instruments. We use Danish administrative panel data. Average class size is 20, about the same as in the US and most European countries. Restricting the sample to observations close to the enrolment discontinuity points where the administrative rules have greatest predictive power, instrumental variables estimates are consistently negative. Estimates from the preferred specification are marginally significant and indicate modest effects in line with earlier studies. Estimates for subgroups are less precise, but they indicate larger effects for pupils from less advantaged backgrounds.

For employees who get cancer and survive, the probability of returning to work may depend on their ability to work, potential earnings losses if they do not return to work, qualifications and job type, but also on characteristics of the pre-cancer workplace. This paper focuses on differences between public and private sector employees in the effect of breast cancer on the probability of being out of the labour force three years after the diagnosis. We use propensity score weighting methods and a large longitudinal Danish administrative dataset which allows us to control for a wide range of important baseline characteristics such as education, sector of employment, labour market status, income, health, and demographics. We find that the educational gradient in the effect of cancer is significant in the public sector, where the estimated effects are 11.5 and 3.8 percentage points, respectively, for the low- and high-educated. The corresponding estimates for the private sector are 6.2 and 3.2 percentage points and here the educational gradient is only marginally significant. We discuss possible mechanisms behind the large sector gradient for the low-educated.

This paper investigates determinants of local authorities’ school expenditure. Hypotheses are derived from an expenditure demand model incorporating a school cost function. The empirical analysis exploits the panel structure of the dataset (for the 275 municipalities in Denmark over the period 1984–1996) by Generalized Method of Moments estimation of a dynamic model taking into account unobserved municipal-specific effects and possible endogeneity of the explanatory variables. Comparing with more standard estimations of the model, the results indicate that flexible estimation of a dynamic model controlling for unobserved municipal-specific effects is needed to avoid biased parameter estimates.

Background The purpose of this study was to investigate whether there is an association between stage of incident breast cancer (BC) and personal income three years after diagnosis. The analysis further considered whether the association differed among educational groups. Methods The study was based on information from Danish nationwide registers. A total of 7,372 women aged 30–60 years diagnosed with BC, 48% with metastasis, were compared to 213,276 controls. Generalised linear models were used to estimate the effect of a cancer diagnosis on personal gross income three years after diagnosis, stratified by education and stage of cancer. The models were adjusted for income two years prior to cancer diagnosis and demographic, geographic and co-morbidity covariates. Results Adjusting for income two years prior to cancer diagnosis and other baseline covariates (see above), cancer had a minor effect on personal income three years after diagnosis. The effect of metastatic BC was a statistically significant reduction in income three years after diagnosis of −3.4% (95% CI −4.8;-2.0), −2.8% (95% CI −4.3;-1.3) and −4.1 (95% CI −5.9;-2.3) among further, vocational and low educated women, respectively. The corresponding estimates for the effect of localised BC were −2.5% (95% CI −3.8; −1.2), −1.6% (95% CI −3.0; −0.2) and −1.7% (95% CI −3.7; 0.3); the latter estimate (for the low-educated) was not statistically different from zero. We found no statistically significant educational gradient in the effect of cancer stage on income. Conclusions In a Danish context, the very small negative effect of BC on personal income may be explained by different types of compensation in low- and high-income groups. The public income transfers are equal for all income groups and cover a relatively high compensation among low-income groups. However, high-income groups additionally receive pay-outs from private pension and insurance schemes, which typically provide higher coverage for high-income workers.

Analysing young people's educational choices, we derive and test implications of a relative risk aversion hypothesis: that educational choices are made so as to minimize the risk of ending up with a lower level of education than one's parents. These implications are in general different from what one would expect from human capital theory. We use a unique data set which combines data from administrative registers on young people's pathways through the educational system and their family background with survey data on their academic abilities at lower secondary school. The evidence is partly in favour of the relative risk aversion hypothesis.

Denmark, Norway, New Zealand, Canada and the USA are the OECD countries that spend most on education, measured in relation to GDP. Focusing in particular on upper secondary education, this paper examines whether the heavy expenditure on education in Denmark is matched by high output from the educational sector, both in terms of a large number of students enrolled in educational programmes and a high completion rate. The methodology used is to compare (benchmark) Denmark with a relevant group of countries and to calculate how much cheaper Denmark could teach the same number of students and maintain the same graduation/completion rates as today if the country could achieve the same level of cost effectiveness as its most efficient counterparts. Comparing Denmark to a group of the richest OECD countries reveals that potential savings lie between 12 and 34 percent. Figures that fall to between zero and nine percent when a comparison is made between Denmark and other Northern European countries. On the input side, the slightly weaker academic level among young people in Denmark on completion of lower secondary education – as measured by the PISA scores of the various countries – goes some way to explain the higher costs of upper secondary education. On the output side, if earnings and levels of employment among those who complete their education are taken into account, then Denmark is in fact found to be efficient. However, this high level of efficiency has become less clear-cut in recent years, since expected earnings (multiplied by rate of employment) is currently falling in comparison with the expected earnings in the peer countries. This might be an indication that Denmark’s current position is not stable, unless the present situation is entirely attributable to the economic downturn in the wake of the financial crisis.

We estimate relations for consumers’ demand for repair and maintenance of houses. Repair and maintenance services have close substitutes in the black economy and via do-it-yourself production. The tax wedge is included as an explanatory variable, since it is a measure of the price of paid and taxed services relative to services produced by black market or do-it-yourself activities. On Danish macroeconomic time series data large elasticities with respect to prices and the tax wedge are estimated. We estimate simple level equations and error correction models and test for cointegration.

The great majority of studies on the effect of school quality on academicoutcomes do not take account of changes in student choices concerning effortif school quality, e.g. class size, changes. We show that empiricalestimates of the ‘total’ effect of changes in school qualitycould be quite different from the ‘partial’ effect holding otherinputs (including student effort) constant. The main parameters governingthis difference are the extent to which inputs in the education productionfunction are substitutes or complements and how kinked is the benefit from ahigher mark. The difference depends also on student ability, thestudent’s distaste for effort and the curvature of the educationproduction with respect to effort. JEL classification I21; I28

This paper considers several tests of orthogonality conditions in linear models where stochastic errors may be heteroskedastic or autocorrelated. It is shown that these tests can be performed with Wald statistics obtained from simple auxiliary regressions. Copyright 1997 by Blackwell Publishing Ltd

A macroeconomic rationing model based on nested CES transaction functions for the goods and labour markets is presented. The model is estimated on quarterly data for the Danish private non-agricultural sector, using regime proportion indicators based on business survey information. The focus of the paper is on the method of estimation, which is a two-step procedure. To take account of the fact that some of the variables of the model are integrated of order one, the corresponding parameters are estimated by cointegration techniques (the Johansen method) in the first step. In the second step the other parameters of the model are estimated simultaneously by GMM. It is argued that this two-step estimation procedure is consistent. Finally, the estimation results are used to cast some light on the rise in Danish unemployment in the period 1971–1990.

We estimate causal effects of breast and colorectal cancer on labour market outcomes 1-3 years after the diagnosis. Based on Danish administrative data we estimate average treatment effects on the treated by propensity score weighting methods using persons with no cancer diagnosis as control group. We conduct robustness checks using matching, difference-in-differences methods and an alternative control group of later cancer patients. The different methods give approximately the same results. Cancer increases the risks of leaving the labour force and receiving disability pension, and the effects are larger for the less educated. Effects on income are small and mostly insignificant. We investigate some of the mechanisms which may be important in explaining the educational gradient in effects of cancer on labour market attachment.

We estimate the effect of active labour-market programmes on the exit rate to regular employment for non-western immigrants in Denmark who receive social assistance. We use the timing-of-events duration model and rich administrative data. We find large positive post-programme effects, and, surprisingly, even most in-programme effects are positive. The effects are largest for subsidized employment programmes, but effects are also large and significant for direct employment programmes and other programmes. Effects are larger if programmes begin after six months of unemployment. Implications of our estimates are illustrated by calculating effects on the duration to regular employment over a five-year period. JEL classification codes J64, J24, J68, J61, C41

We investigate whether job loss due to plant closure causes an increased risk of (cause-specific) mortality and hospitalization for male workers having strong labour market attachment. We use administrative data: a panel of all persons in Denmark in the period 1980-2006, containing records on health and work status, and a link from workers to plants. We use propensity score weighting combined with non-parametric duration analysis. We find that job loss increases the risk of overall mortality and mortality caused by circulatory disease; of suicide and suicide attempts; and of death and hospitalization due to traffic accidents, alcohol-related disease, and mental illness. Language: en

Performance is perhaps the most central concept in public administration research, and this article discusses theoretically and investigates empirically how we can obtain more consistent performance measures. Theoretically, we combine existing arguments in public administration with institutional theory and the sociology of professions. Empirically, we ask whether different measures of individual performance produce different results. The investigated performance measures vary with regard to risk of common data source bias, standardization of assessment criteria, and external verification of the assessment. Our investigated explanatory variables are intrinsic motivation, public service motivation, and job satisfaction. Combining survey and administrative data for 747 lower secondary school teachers (teaching 5,679 students in 85 schools), we analyze 4 different measures of the same performance dimension for the same teachers: the teachers’ self-reported contributions to students’ academic skills, the students’ marks for the year’s work given by the teacher, marks in oral exams with one external examiner and the teacher, and marks in written exams with at least one external examiner. The associations are systematically stronger when the performance measure comes from the same data source as the explanatory variables, but when separate data sources are used and the measurement scale is institutionalized, the level of external verification does not matter much. Based on institutional theory and the sociology of professions, we develop a theoretical argument that can explain this.

SummaryIn recent years a large number of macroeconomic rationing models with smooth CES transaction functions have been estimated. The widely used CES transaction functions with three arguments are often claimed to be derivable (as approximate relationships) from an assumption of lognormally distributed demands and supplies. One objective of this paper is to point out that the reasoning offered in the literature for this claim is not very clear or rigorous. Another, and more constructive, objective is to analyse and discuss in detail the derivation and properties of the CES transaction functions. Basic assumptions underlying the CES transaction functions are illuminated on the basis of a rather general description of the aggregation problem in models with both goods and labour markets, and general properties of transaction functions based on “multiplicative distributional assumptions” are analysed. Several new results concerning the exact derivation of the CES transaction functions on the basis of the Weibull distribution are shown. The quality of the CES transaction functions as approximate relationships given lognormally distributed demands and supplies is discussed. Finally it is shown that the CES transaction functions have reasonable properties.

Relations for consumers' demand for paid and taxed services with close substitutes in the black economy or via do-it-yourself production are estimated. The tax wedge is included as an explanatory variable, since it is a proxy for the price of paid and taxed services relative to services produced by black market or do-it-yourself activities. On Danish macroeconomic time series data large elasticities w.r.t. price and tax wedge are estimated. We estimate error correction models, test for cointegration, and take account of continuous structural change.