Abstract Scarring effects of unemployment on subjective well-being (SWB), i.e., negative effects that remain even after workers reenter employment, are well documented in the literature. Nevertheless, the theoretical mechanisms by which unemployment leads to long-lasting negative consequences for SWB are still under debate. Thus, we theorize that unemployment can have an enduring impact mainly through (1) the experience of unemployment as an incisive life event and (2) unemployment as a driver of future unemployment. In the empirical part, we focus on one important dimension of SWB: overall life satisfaction. Based on advanced longitudinal modeling that controls for group-specific trends, we estimate scarring through unemployment using the German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP). Our results consistently show a large negative effect of unemployment on life satisfaction as well as significant scarring effects that last at least 5 years after reemployment for both men and women as well as for short- and long-term unemployment spells. Further analyses reveal that repeated periods of unemployment drive these effects and cause even longer lasting scarring, implying that there are hardly any adaptations to unemployment that buffer its effect on life satisfaction. We conclude that scarring effects mainly work through repeated episodes of unemployment. Regarding policy implications, our findings suggest that preventing unemployment, regardless of its duration, is beneficial for individual well-being not only in the short term.

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失业带来的主观幸福感：来自长期专家组的新证据

摘要 失业对主观幸福感（SWB）的疤痕效应，即即使在工人重新就业后仍然存在的负面影响，在文献中有很好的记载。然而，失业对 SWB 造成长期负面影响的理论机制仍在争论中。因此，我们推测失业可以产生持久的影响，主要是通过 (1) 将失业作为一种深刻的生活事件的经历和 (2) 失业作为未来失业的驱动因素。在实证部分，我们关注 SWB 的一个重要维度：整体生活满意度。基于控制特定群体趋势的高级纵向模型，我们使用德国社会经济小组 (SOEP) 估计失业造成的疤痕。我们的结果始终显示失业对生活满意度有很大的负面影响，以及在男性和女性重新就业后以及短期和长期失业期间持续至少 5 年的显着疤痕效应。进一步的分析表明，反复失业会推动这些影响，并造成更持久的疤痕，这意味着几乎没有任何对失业的适应可以缓冲其对生活满意度的影响。我们得出结论，疤痕效应主要通过反复的失业事件发挥作用。关于政策影响，我们的研究结果表明，预防失业，无论其持续时间长短，不仅在短期内有益于个人福祉。