Does Fixed-Term Employment Have Spillover Effects on the Well-Being of Partners? A Panel Data Analysis for East and West Germany

Scheuring, Sonja; Voßemer, Jonas; Baranowska-Rataj, Anna; Tattarini, Giulia Article — Published Version Does Fixed-Term Employment Have Spillover Effects on the Well-Being of Partners? A Panel Data Analysis for East and West Germany Journal of Happiness Studies Provided in Cooperation with: WZB Berlin Social Science Center Suggested Citation: Scheuring, Sonja; Voßemer, Jonas; Baranowska-Rataj, Anna; Tattarini, Giulia (2021) : Does Fixed-Term Employment Have Spillover Effects on the Well-Being of Partners? A Panel Data Analysis for East and West Germany, Journal of Happiness Studies, ISSN 1573-7780, Springer, Berlin, Vol. 22, Iss. 7, pp. 3001-3021, https://doi.org/10.1007/s10902-020-00353-2 This Version is available at: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/229646 Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen: Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden. 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If the documents have been made available under an Open Content Licence (especially Creative Commons Licences), you may exercise further usage rights as specified in the indicated licence. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Vol.:(0123456789) Journal of Happiness Studies (2021) 22:3001–3021 https://doi.org/10.1007/s10902-020-00353-2 1 3 RESEARCH PAPER Does Fixed‑Term Employment Have Spillover Effects ontheWell‑Being ofPartners? APanel Data Analysis forEast andWest Germany SonjaScheuring1 · JonasVoßemer2· AnnaBaranowska‑Rataj3· GiuliaTattarini4 Accepted: 29 December 2020 / Published online: 19 January 2021 © The Author(s) 2021 Abstract This paper answers three research questions: What is the impact of fixed-term employment on the well-being of partners? How do these spillover effects differ by gender, and do gender differences depend on socialization in East or West Germany? Do individual wellbeing, perceived job insecurity, and financial worries mediate the spillover effects? We use longitudinal data from the Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP), 1995–2017, and a sample of heterosexual couples living together, to estimate fixed-effects panel regression models. In contrast to previous studies, we consider asymmetric effects of entering and leaving fixedterm contracts by focusing on transitions from unemployment into fixed-term and fixedterm into permanent jobs. Confirming previous research on spillover effects of unemployment, we find that fixed-term re-employment increases partners’ well-being and that these effects are larger in case of re-employment by men and partners’ socialization in West Germany. We also show that transitions from fixed-term to permanent jobs do not substantially increase the well-being of partners with little differences by gender and place of socialization. While the spillover effect of re-employment is mediated by changes in the well-being of the individual re-entering the labor market, changes in job insecurity and financial worries due to transitions from fixed-term to permanent jobs are too small to produce meaningful effects on well-being. Although fixed-term contracts have been referred to as a new source of inequality, our results show that they cause little difference in the well-being of individuals and their partners and that finding a job matters more than the type of contract. Keywords Fixed-term employment· Well-being· Spillover effects· Panel data· Mediation analysis· Germany Supplementary information The online version of this article (https ://doi.org/10.1007/s1090 2-020- 00353 -2) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. * Sonja Scheuring [email protected] 1 University ofBamberg, Bamberg, Germany 2 MZES Mannheim Centre forEuropean Social Research, Mannheim, Germany 3 Umeå University, Umeå, Sweden 4 WZB Berlin Social Center, Berlin, Germany 3002 S.Scheuring et al. 1 3 1 Introduction Employment is a key determinant of well-being, and more specifically, life satisfaction (Luhmann etal. 2012), i.e., the balance between individual expectations regarding life and the fulfillment of these expectations (Veenhoven 2009). The flexibilization of labor markets over the last three decades led to growing concerns about job insecurity (Kalleberg 2018), and, in particular, the potential negative effects of fixed-term contracts for well-being (De Witte etal. 2016). In response to employers’ demands for flexibility, governments deregulated employment protection and promoted the use of fixed-term jobs. These jobs are characterized by a predetermined expiry date, which leaves it up to employers to decide whether to continue the employment relationship. In Germany, about 40% of newly created jobs start with a fixed-term contract (Bossler etal. 2019), which underlines the importance of understanding their impact on the well-being of individuals and their partners. On the one hand, fixed-term contracts are hoped to support the labor market integration of the unemployed (Barbieri 2009) and intended to serve as a stepping stone towards permanent employment. Since unemployment has detrimental and long-lasting consequences for the well-being of individuals (Wanberg 2012; Mousteri etal. 2018), governments have seen fixed-term contracts as a promising tool for improving the labor market prospects of disadvantaged groups (Korpi and Levin 2001; DiPrete etal. 2006) and subsequently their well-being. On the other hand, it is also assumed that fixed-term contracts are in many ways inferior to permanent contracts. The concern is that they go along with chronic job insecurity and that workers are trapped in the secondary labor market segment, which offers lower job quality (De Cuyper etal. 2009). Therefore, fixed-term employees experience a lack of certainty and planability regarding their future, which worsens their well-being. Some even argue that these jobs have similar or worse consequences than unemployment, because the anticipation of a job loss is more stressful than the actual joblessness itself (Inanc 2018). Given these two perspectives, a rich literature on the consequences of fixed-term contracts on well-being developed (for an overview see Imhof and Andresen 2018; De Cuyper etal. 2008; Virtanen etal. 2005). Previous research often compares fixed-term with permanent contracts and refers to the entrapment scenario by emphasizing the fears associated with these jobs. In line with this view, a large share of cross-sectional studies reports negative effects (for overview see De Cuyper etal. 2008). Some longitudinal studies also point at a disadvantage among temporary workers (Dawson et al. 2017; De Graaf-Zijl 2012). Other longitudinal studies reveal an ambiguous picture, with some finding substantial positive effects of permanent over fixed-term employment (e.g., Gash etal. 2007), while others report only minor differences (Gebel and Voßemer 2014). Despite the desired integrational function (stepping stone scenario), few studies compare fixed-term contracts to unemployment. Although most of these studies find that fixedterm jobs are preferable to unemployment (Gundert and Hohendanner 2014; Gash etal. 2007), some theoretically assume and empirically find no differences in well-being (Chambel et al. 2016). Other studies show that insecure employment has even more negative effects than unemployment (Burchell 1994; Kim and von dem Knesebeck 2015). Scholars have started to consider that job insecurity may affect not only employees with fixed-term contracts, but also their partners. Employment contracts may affect decisions made jointly by the couple. For example, fixed-term employment of one partner can postpone childbirth, decrease the likelihood of marriage, and the chance of home ownership (Baron and Rapp 2019; Auer and Danzer 2016). However, despite 3003 Does Fixed‑Term Employment Have Spillover Effects onthe… 1 3 this research on couples, almost no studies have investigated so-called spillover effects, that is the impact of fixed-term employment of one person on the well-being of their partner. This lack of studies is surprising, as such spillover effects have been previously found for unemployment and job losses (Marcus 2013; Nikolova and Ayhan 2019). The only exception is Inanc (2018), who shows that in the United Kingdom (UK) the negative impact of fixed-term compared to permanent contracts on well-being extends to the partner and is of similar size to the spillover effect of unemployment. The lack of research on spillover effects of fixed-term jobs on family members is an important issue, as its costs or benefits might be seriously misjudged if the focus is on the directly affected individuals only. The main goal of this paper is to extend research on the spillover effects of fixed-term employment on the well-being of partners. We seek to make three contributions to the literature. First, our main contribution to research on the well-being consequences of fixedterm contracts is the analysis of spillover effects in the German context, thereby extending the only previous study on this topic for the UK (Inanc 2018). Germany is particularly interesting, since its labor market is regulated with a rather strict separation between the primary, advantageous segment with mostly permanent and securely employed individuals and the secondary, disadvantageous segment, including lower quality jobs with e.g., fixed-term contracts (for a detailed discussion of the German labor market see Gundert and Hohendanner 2014). Thus, the effects might be even more detrimental than for the UK, a country with a flexible labor market. Second, as Inanc (2018) highlights the heterogeneity in spillover effects by gender, an additional contribution is to investigate how women and men react differently to fixedterm employment of their partners. The German context offers a unique opportunity in this respect. While East and West Germany share both labor market and family policies, they still differ in terms of gender norms and roles, which even affect the cohorts born after reunification (Ebner etal. 2020; Bauernschuster and Rainer 2012). We consider how gender differences in the spillover effects depend on partners’ place of socialization in either East or West Germany to improve our current understanding of the conditions under whichgender differences in spillover effects emerge. The place of socialization provides information about gender role attitudes, which are passed on in the primary socialization from parents to children and should differ between East and West Germany. Whereas previous studies on the effects of fixed-term employment on well-being already found important differences by countries (Täht etal. 2020; Karabchuk and Soboleva 2020), no studies so far have examined the relevance of the place of socialization with respect to spillover effects. Third, we shed light on the plausibility of the theoretical explanations put forward for spillover effects. We empirically test whether changes in the individual well-being, perceived job insecurity, and financial worries resulting from labor market transitions transmit to the partners’ well-being. While these mediators are derived from theoretical models and have been suggested as relevant (Silla etal. 2009), they have not yet been empirically tested in the context of spillover effects. To answer the research questions, we use longitudinal data from the German Socio- Economic Panel (SOEP), 1995–2017, and apply fixed-effects panel regression models. To bridge the two opposing perspectives, which emphasize the benefits and costs of fixed-term jobs, we compare fixed-term jobs to both unemployment and permanent jobs. We focus on transitions from unemployment to fixed-term and fixed-term to permanent employment. These specific transitions aremost closely related to the debates that motivate our study, that is fixed-term contracts as a means of labor market integration for the unemployed and its potentialrole as a stepping stone. 3004 S.Scheuring et al. 1 3 2 Theory andhypotheses The benefits of stable employment for individual well-being can be understood from Warr’s vitamin model (Warr 2017). This theory explains how environmental factors determine the well-being of individuals. The vitamins refer to twelve distinct factors, which include the opportunity for personal control, social contact, availability of money or career outlook, and other factors. Different domains of life, such as work or family, provide these benefits. In analogy to vitamins, these factors and their components are in over- or under-dosage expected to be harmful for well-being. When referring to the work context, distinct job situations offer different amounts of vitamins. In line with previous studies (Gebel and Voßemer 2014; Scherer 2009), we assume a continuum from unemployment, which offers the least vitamins, to permanent employment, which offers the most vitamins, with fixed-term contracts somewhere in between the extremes. Compared to permanent employment, fixed-term employment offers poorer working conditions (Booth etal. 2002) and less economic security, which negatively affects the controllability and planability of life (Bosmans etal. 2016; Lazarus and Folkman 1984). Hence, these jobs differently affect the vitamin balance of individuals and consequently their well-being. But how do these effects then transfer to the partner? The spillover-crossover model can shed light on this question (Bakker and Demerouti 2013; Rodríguez-Muñoz etal. 2014). This model distinguishes intra-individual spillover effects, i.e., bad mood at work transmits to home, from inter-individual crossover effects, i.e., bad mood of an individual transmits to closely related individuals, such as the partner. In line with many other researchers, we use the term ‘spillover’ to cover both intra- and inter-individual effects (Inanc 2018; Marcus 2013; Nikolova and Ayhan 2019) that lead to a transmission of effects from one partner to the other. 2.1 The spillover effects offixed‑term employment onsubjective well‑being The work-related sphere of life may affect the way that individuals feel and behave. Previous research documents consequences such as concentration difficulties, elevated irritability, stress, and anxiety, having less energy and vigor, social withdrawal, and less support towards the partner (Danner-Vlaardingerbroek etal. 2013; Jiang and Lavaysse 2018; Mantler etal. 2005; Repetti and Wang 2017). When individual well-being declines, the resulting emotional reactions and behaviors can be a strain on closely related people, such as partners, which can in turn deteriorate their well-being (Rook etal. 1991; Bakker etal. 2009). Apart from being exposed to behavioral changesand a lack of emotional availability and support from the persons, partners may experience a deterioration in well-being due to empathy, i.e., sharing the emotional states and well-being of the persons. There are also alternative mechanisms that may drive the effects that can occur at the partnership level. Some mechanisms relate to the need of couples to plan their life decisions together, considering the employment situations of both partners (Blom etal. 2020). Perceived job insecurities and financial worries might prevent shared future planning regarding home ownership or childbearing (Blossfeld etal. 2005; Baron and Rapp 2019). Referring back to the vitamin model (Warr 2017), when individuals gain vitamins through re-entering the work environment or by a transition from fixed-term to permanent jobs, these can be utilized to satisfy shared goals of partners. 3005 Does Fixed‑Term Employment Have Spillover Effects onthe… 1 3 Following these arguments, the scale of employment situations related amounts of vitamins, ranging from unemployment, through fixed-term contracts, to permanent employment, is associated not only with individual well-being, but also with the well-being of partners. The transition to more secure positions is linked to a gain in vitamins. Thus, if an individual makes a transition from unemployment to fixed-term employment, the positive feelings about regaining financial resources and other functions of work might go beyond this individual and extend to the partner. Moreover, such ‘upward’ transitions enable couples to fulfil shared goals, which affect both partners’ well-being. H1a A transition from unemployment into fixed-term employment as compared to remaining unemployed positively affects the well-being of one’s partner. H1b A transition from fixed-term into permanent employment as compared to remaining in fixed-term employment positively affects the well-being of one’s partner. 2.2 Gender differences andhowthey vary byplace ofsocialization According to the doing gender theory (West and Zimmermann 1987), individuals expect that their partners behave in gender-specific ways that shape the division of labor in couples. More specifically, men are supposed to be the breadwinners and women the homemakers. Gainful employment, which enables men to satisfy the material needs of a household, is understood as a signal of masculinity. Unemployment represents a deviation from gender-specific behavior for men, but not for women. Women can substitute employment by engaging in their alternative and socially acceptable role as housewives, which can protect their well-being (Nordenmark and Strandh 1999). Fixed-term employment exceeds unemployment for the associated vitamins, as it enables men to fulfill their normative obligations by providing material resources to the household. When compared to permanent employment, fixed-term employment can, however, also be seen as a deviation from masculinity. Due to the lower job quality, there is a lower likelihood to be able to provide the family with a stable income (Inanc 2018). Therefore, when the male partner makes an ‘upward’ transition regarding the employment status, this enables the breadwinner norm to be met and thus satisfies the expectations of the female partner. This expectation does not apply to similar transitions of women and their male partners’ well-being, since, according to doing gender theories, it is not the key role of women to earn a living. H2a The positive spillover effects of a transition from unemployment into fixed-term employment as compared to remaining unemployed on the well-being of the partners will be stronger for female than for male partners’ well-being. H2b The positive spillover effects of a transition from fixed-term employment into permanent employment as compared to remaining in fixed-term employment on the well-being of the partners will be stronger for female than for male partners’ well-being. What doing gender exactly means is determined by contexts such as socialization in East or West Germany. The roles described above are more firmly entrenched and transferred in primary socialization in conservative societies (Sainsbury 1996). Germany has the special situation of two contexts with different gender role attitudes within one country. 3006 S.Scheuring et al. 1 3 The legacy of the GDR can still be seen today (Ebner etal. 2020). The meaning of doing gender and the importance of gender should therefore depend on the socialization in East or West Germany. In the GDR, a dual-earner model with a strong labor force participation of women shaped individuals’ gender norms towards an egalitarian model. Primary socialization in the family and secondary socialization in the school promoted equal gender roles. West Germany, on the other side, with its traditional gender roles, was and is a standard example of the male-breadwinner model (Bauernschuster and Rainer 2012). For women who have been socialized in West Germany, a suboptimal employment position of the male partner should reflect a stronger deviation from the gender-specific behavior of being the breadwinner than for women socialized in East Germany. By contrast, since gender roles have been more equal in East Germany, it should not be relevant what gender the individual who experiences the ‘upward’ transition is. The effects should be equally beneficial to the partner. In conclusion, gendered spillover effects should be more relevant for the partners’ well-being in case of socialization in West than in East Germany. H3a The more positive spillover effect of a transition from unemployment into fixed-term employment as compared to remaining unemployed on the well-being of female than male partners will be stronger for affected partners who have been socialized in West than in East Germany. H3b The more positive spillover effect of a transition from fixed-term into permanent employment as compared to remaining in fixed-term employment on the well-being of female than male partners will be stronger for affected partners who have been socialized in West than in East Germany. 2.3 Factors mediating thespillover effects A few studies have argued that fixed-term employment is equally or even more harmful than unemployment regarding well-being (Burchell 1994; Inanc 2018). Most research, however, assumes the opposite. Fixed-term employment compared to unemployment offers vitamins like financial resources, social contacts as well as social standing (Gash et al. 2007), which should improve the well-being of individuals. By comparison, permanent contracts offer greater job security and as previous studies show a higher income (Booth et al. 2002). As a result, compared to fixed-term employment, permanent employment offers more vitamins, which enhance the job satisfaction, and consequently the well-being of individuals. These improvements due to ‘upward’ transitions do not only occur within the working domain, but also transfer to the family life, which boosts the relationship quality (Blom et al. 2020). The corresponding employment transitions reduce the pressure and stress caused by insecurity and reduced planability of the previous employment status. If individuals are less distressed and have a higher well-being, this also transmits to the well-being of their partners (Westman 2016). H4a The positive spillover effect of a transition from unemployment into fixed-term employment as compared to remaining unemployed on the well-being of the partner will be partly mediated by changes in the well-being of the individual who experiences the transition. 3007 Does Fixed‑Term Employment Have Spillover Effects onthe… 1 3 H4b The positive spillover effect of a transition from fixed-term into permanent employment as compared to remaining in fixed-term employment on the well-being of the partner will be partly mediated by changes in the well-being of the individual who experiences the transitions. Finally, while an individual under-dosage of all vitamins of the unemployed should explain positive spillover effects for transitions into fixed-term employment, the difference in the vitamins provided by fixed-term compared to permanent jobs is not so clear. In terms of income differentials, fixed-term jobs might be considered by employers as a prolonged probationary period (Booth etal. 2002). Fixed-term employees may therefore receive a lower salary than permanent employees, which leads to more financial worries. Financial worries make it more difficult for couples to achieve common goals. If fixed-term employees make the transition to permanent employment, the financial difficulties should decrease. In addition, as fixed-term jobs expire, workers may perceive job insecurity, which decreases as they make the transition into permanent employment. Therefore, the ‘upward’ employment transition reduces stress and negative emotions and thus increases well-being (Warr 2017). This well-being boost might accordingly transmit to the partner through empathy. H5 The positive effect of a transition from fixed-term into permanent employment as compared to remaining in fixed-term employment on the well-being of the individual who experiences the transition will be partly mediated by changes in job insecurity and financial worries. 3 Methods 3.1 Data andSample We use data from the Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP), which began in 1984 (Liebig etal. 2019). The SOEP is an annual household panel survey designed to be nationally representative of the German adult population. Nearly 15,000 households and 30,000 individuals participate (Goebel etal. 2019). For our analyses, the SOEP has three main advantages. First, it offers detailed annual data on activity status, type of contract, and well-being. Second, we have independent information from both partners, as each adult household member is interviewed separately. Third, the SOEP is one of the longest running household panel surveys, which allows us to study the spillover effects of specific employment transitions. More specifically, we can relate changes in the well-being of partners to changes in the activity status and type of contract of individuals. For the analyses, we select an initial sample of cohabiting and married heterosexual couples living together, where both partners participate in the personal interview. We only use waves from 1995 or later, as information on the type of contract for the previous years is incomplete. To focus on the working age population, we restrict our sample to couples where both partners are between 18 and 65years old. As we want to investigate the spillover effects of fixed-term employment in comparison to both unemployment and permanent employment, our analyses focus on two specific transitions: (1) from unemployment to fixed-term and (2) from fixed-term to permanent employment. 3008 S.Scheuring et al. 1 3 These transitions directly relate to the debates that motivate our study. We focus on the role of fixed-term contracts as a means of labor market integration for the unemployed and as a stepping stone from fixed-term to permanent jobs. This study design reduces ambiguities that are associated with the reverse transition from permanent to fixed-term jobs. Within one job, transitions from permanent to fixed-term jobs are prohibited by German labor law. Thus, these transitions will always be associated with a change of jobs, which potentially includes an additional period of non-employment. As a result, it is difficult to assess which changes are responsible for effects on the wellbeing of partners (i.e., contract status or intermediate non-employment). Our study design regarding the focus on specific employment transitions allows a relaxation of the assumption of symmetric effects. Symmetry in effects is an implicit assumption in standard specifications of fixed-effects models (Allison 2019). We assume asymmetry, because it is theoretically argued that “losses loom larger than gains” (Kahneman and Tversky 1979; Hobfoll 1988). In addition, a recent study on the effects of fixed-term contracts on individuals’ well-being shows that transitions from fixed-term to permanent employment and vice versa have effects of different magnitude (Schumann and Kuchinke 2020). Thus,the study points toan asymmetry of effects. While fixedeffects panel analyses in previous studies (Inanc 2018) implicitly assume symmetric effects (Allison 2019), our focus on specific transitions makes no assumptions in this regard. We further restrict our sample to couples where at least one partner is at risk of experiencing a transition of interest between twoyearly interviews t and t+1 . This includes couples where at least one partner makes the transition from either unemployment to fixed-term or fixed-term to permanent employment (treatment spells). The definition also includes couples where at least one partner continuously remains in the original activity status and contract type (control spells). The latter couples provide information on how the well-being of the partner would have changed in the absence of a transition from either unemployment to fixed-term or fixed-term to permanent employment (Brüderl and Ludwig 2015). We finally exclude couples with missing values on the variables of interest and restrict the sample to couples observed at least twice. For the analyses of transitions from unemployment to fixed-term employment, this leaves us with 2373 couples and 9531 coupleyears, while for transitions from fixed-term to permanent employment we have data on 2990 couples and 16,418 couple-years. In these samples, we observe 536 and 560 transitions from unemployment to fixed-term employment and 1409 and 1567 transitions from fixed-term to permanent employment by men and women, respectively. 3.2 Measures 3.2.1 Dependent variable Our outcome is the life satisfaction of the partner, which primarily captures the cognitive component of subjective well-being (Veenhoven 2009). Partners are asked how satisfied they are with life, all things considered, with answers ranging from 0 “completely dissatisfied” to 10 “completely satisfied” on an 11-point scale. Global life satisfaction scales have been shown to be valid, reliable, and sensitive to change, making them well-suited for our analyses (Diener etal. 2013). 3015 Does Fixed‑Term Employment Have Spillover Effects onthe… 1 3 for these factors. These factors seem to mediate the total positive effect, since the direct effect equals zero. While this finding supports the theoretically assumed mechanisms, overall reduced job insecurity and financial worries together with other changes lead to only slight improvements in men’s well-being. In line with the previous findings on spillover effects, transitions from fixed-term to permanent employment slightly decrease women’s own well-being (total effect of − 0.05). Accounting for job insecurity and financial worries increases this negative impact further by 0.03 units (indirect effect) to − 0.08 units (direct effect). The fact that the direct effect is more negative than the total effect is, however, in line with the theoretical explanations, which expect a positive indirect effect via reduced job insecurity and financial worries. In other words, by controlling for job insecurity and financial worries, we take out these positive indirect effects, such that the direct effect is more negative than the total effect. In line with previous findings, we show that fixed-term employment as compared to permanent employment only slightly affects the well-being of individuals (Schumann and Kuchinke 2020; De Witte 2010; Gebel and Voßemer 2014). However, we do not find consistent effects across genders. If at all, transitions from fixed-term to permanent jobs seem to slightly decrease the well-being of women, while they only marginally increase the wellbeing of men. 4.3 Robustness checks To further contextualize our findings regarding the spillover effects of transitions from unemployment to fixed-term and fixed-term to permanent employment, we examine the spillover effects of transitions from unemployment to permanent employment. We use our basic model specification including gendered spillover effects (OR 1, TableS4). We find that the spillover effects of transitions into permanent employment are only slightly larger (0.35 units for transitions by men, 0.07 units for the transitions by women) than the effects of transitions from unemployment to fixed-term employment (0.30 units for employment transitions by men, 0.07 units for respective transitions by women). Thus, for re-employ- ment, the type of contract does not seem to matter much in terms of the spillover effects on well-being. We also check the robustness of our results with respect to the age range of 18–65years. We estimate our basic models only for individuals and partners who are between 20 and 45years old (OR 1, TableS5). The effect sizes for the smaller age range do not differ significantly from our main analyses. Thus, our conclusions remain unchanged. To examine possible heterogeneity within fixed-term employment, we use additional information on temporary agency work, that has been available in the SOEP since 2001. We distinguish between fixed-term temporary agency workers (TAW) and other fixed-term employees (NTAW). We estimate our basic model specification (OR 1, TableS6). For men, the positive spillover effect for transitions from unemployment to fixed-term employment is somewhat weaker for TAW (0.23 units) than for NTAW (0.31 units), while for women the effects are quite similar (0.14 units for TAW, 0.10 units for NTAW). For transitions from fixed-term to permanent employment, there is a positive effect for transitions from TAW by men (0.42 units) and women (0.39 units), and a negative effect for transitions from NTAW by men (− 0.14 units) and women (− 0.06 units). While this indicates heterogeneity within fixed-term employment, these latter results are based on a very small number of observations in TAW. Consequently, the estimated effects are highly uncertain. In addition to this 3016 S.Scheuring et al. 1 3 uncertainty, these results do not change our finding that, on average, there is no spillover effect for transitions from fixed-term to permanent employment. 5 Discussion In this study, we extend the knowledge on how fixed-term employment affects well-being by addressing three research questions. First, are there spillover effects of fixed-term contracts on the well-being of partners? Second, do gendered spillover effects depend on socialization in East or West Germany? Third, are these spillover effects mediated by individual subjective well-being, job insecurity and financial worries? Using long-run panel data on couples from Germany, we analyze transitions from unemployment into fixed-term employment and from fixed-term into permanent employment. In this way, we look at the different perspectives on fixed-term employment by highlighting either their advantages or disadvantages. We combine theoretical arguments from the vitamin model (Warr 2017) with the spillover-crossover model (Bakker and Demerouti 2013) to derive hypotheses about how fixedterm jobs may affect the well-being of partners. We estimate fixed-effects panel regression models, which reveal positive spillover effects of fixed-term re-employment as compared to remaining unemployed. These spillover effects are to a considerable extent mediated by individuals’ own well-being. Our findings are consistent with arguments of the spillovercrossover model regarding the spillover of work into family life and with previous studies, which show that the negative effects of unemployment and job losses extend to partners (Marcus 2013; Nikolova and Ayhan 2019). The results reaffirm research, which suggests that fixed-term re-employment improves well-being over remaining unemployed (Gebel and Voßemer 2014). We find that the positive spillover effects on partners’ well-being are larger for transitions by men on women’s well-being than for transitions by women on men’s well-being. This difference is more pronounced for those who have been socialized in West as compared to East Germany. The findings support the idea that processes of doing gender are shaped by the place of socialization (Bauernschuster and Rainer 2012), and that the legacy of the GDR with respect to gender norms can still be seen (Ebner etal. 2020). Our findings are consistent with the vitamin model, which suggests that fixed-term employment offers more positive functions than unemployment. At the same time, the results are at odds with the idea that fixed-term employment has negative effects on the well-being of individuals similar to those of unemployment (Burchell 1994; Kim and von dem Knesebeck 2015). The results also contradict the findings of a recent study on spillover effects suggesting “that temporary work is at least as detrimental as unemployment for spouses’ subjective well-being” (Inanc 2018, p. 1). In contrast to the only previous study on spillover effects of fixed-term employment for the UK (Inanc 2018), we do not find that fixed-term jobs have any substantial negative effects on partners in comparison to permanent jobs for Germany. When analyzing transitions from fixed-term to permanent employment, we find little or no spillover effects of fixed-term employment and little differences by gender and place of socialization. We show that the absence of positive spillover effects of permanent employment can be explained by the fact that these transitions do not strongly affect the well-being of those individuals who experience the transitions. For women, we even find small negative effects of transitions into permanent employment. While we further reveal that the theoretical mechanisms of 3017 Does Fixed‑Term Employment Have Spillover Effects onthe… 1 3 more vitamins via reduced job insecurity and financial worries are found to hold, these channels are not important enough to produce strong effects on individuals’ own, let alone their partners’ well-being. Our findings are in line with previous research on Germany, which shows that reemployment matters more for well-being than the type of contract (Grün, Hauser and Rhein 2010; Gebel and Voßemer 2014). Considering the findings of Inanc for the UK (2018), our findings might be considered surprising. She expects the negative spillover effects and their gendered patterns to be stronger in labor markets that are more segmented, and in contexts where male-breadwinner norms are more strongly entrenched. This description arguably applies to West Germany. We show that these arguments matter when comparing the gendered spillover effects of fixed-term employment as compared to unemployment for partners socialized in East and West Germany. However, further cross-national comparative research is needed to reconcile the diverging results regarding the spillover effects of fixed-term as compared to permanent employment. Despite the present study’s strengths, some limitations remain. Even though the study focuses on specific transitions to consider asymmetric effects (Schumann and Kuchinke 2020), it does not extensively consider the heterogeneity within fixed-term employment (trajectories). While our robustness checks for fixed-term temporary agency workers indicate some differences, we face the same problem as previous studies, in that we cannot fully account for heterogeneity within fixed-term employment (Imhof and Andresen 2018). Although we follow workers for all years in fixed-term employment before and after a specific transition, it might be that the negative effects of fixed-term employment only emerge if workers repeatedly experience such transitions and remain trapped in insecure jobs. This assumption can be analyzed by studying employment sequences, which include heterogenous forms of fixed-term employment, and outcome dynamics over longer periods. The current study design enables comparisons with previous studies, which also focused on single transitions, and provides first empirical evidence on spillover effects for Germany (Inanc 2018; Schumann and Kuchinke 2020). Even though we complement previous studies by examining specific mediators such as job insecurity and financial worries on the individual level, we could not additionally account for mediators at the couple level (Baron and Rapp 2019). Delayed or even nonexistent transitions into first home ownership or the need to move several times due to frequent job changes might increase stress and consequently reduce the relationship quality (Blom etal. 2020). Since these events are strongly intertwined with employment careers, future research will profit from combing both domains. This strategy would also be in line with theoretical arguments and might give insights into cumulative disadvantages. Overall, this article shows that the effects of employment transitions are not only limited to those individuals who experience it, but also affect their partners. This study furthermore provides evidence that the type of contract seems to be less relevant than being employed at all when it comes to spillover effects on partners’ well-being in Germany. Regarding the scenarios of the integrative potential of fixed-term employment versus fears that persistent job insecurity leads to negative effects of similar magnitude or even worse than unemployment, the former scenario seems to prevail. The positive effect of fixed-term re-employment extends to partners, such that studies which only focus on the affected individuals might underestimate the positive overall effects such transitions entail. Eventually, more in depth (cross-national) studies of the mediators that produce positive spillover effects of fixed-term re-employment will advance our understanding of the processes that link employment careers with partners’ well-being. While we show that these spillover effects could be explained by the positive effects on the well-being 3018 S.Scheuring et al. 1 3 of the directly affected individuals, we still need to understand in greater detail how the intertwined employment and family trajectories affect well-being of both partners in the longer run. Acknowledgements The authors thank two anonymous reviewers as well as Michael Gebel, Anna Kiersztyn, Sophia Fauser, Florian Zimmermann, and Jonathan Latner for helpful discussions and comments. We also thank the discussants and participants of the RC06 Symposium at Rhodes and the ECSR-funded workshop “Labor Market Insecurity and Health of Family Members” at the University of Bamberg for their insightful comments and suggestions. Funding Open Access funding enabled and organized by Projekt DEAL. This research has received funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the Horizon 2020 research and innovation program (grant agreements No 758491 & No 802631). Data availability The data was made available by the German Institute for Economic Research (DIW Berlin). Neither the original collectors of the data, nor the archive, bear any responsibility for the analysis and presentations in this paper. Code availability The computer code for the analysis is available at https ://osf.io/xy6mn /. Compliance with ethical standards Conflicts of interest The authors declare no potential conflict of interest with respect to research, authorship, and publication of this article. Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. 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