German Internet Panel, Wave 39 (January 2019)

The German Internet Panel (GIP) is an infrastructure project. The GIP serves to collect data about individual attitudes and preferences which are relevant for political and economic decision-making processes. The questionnaire contains numerous experimental variations in the survey instruments. For further information, please refer to the study documentation. Topics: Welfare state: government’s responsibility for health care; government and statutory health insurance funds should spend more vs. less money on the health system; self-assessment of health; kind of health insurance; government’s responsibility for an adequate standard of living in old age; government and statutory pension insurance should spend more vs. less money on pensions; preferred statutory retirement age; sources for pension payments received in 2018 (state pension, early retirement pension, occupational pension, private pension, disability pension, dependent’s pension, war pension, long term care benefits, no benefits received); contributions made in 2018 to various types of retirement provision (state pension, occupational pension, private pension, disability insurance, life insurance, other, no pension contribution); Experiment on the financing of old age provision based on the individual pillars of old age provision in Germany (state benefits for basic provision in old age, pensions for civil servants from the state budget, statutory pension insurance, employers and employees through company pensions, each individual through private old age provision). In the question, respondents are asked to choose between two alternatives. The first alternative always remained the same, only its designation (as Status Quo or Proposal 1) was varied. In addition, each respondent is randomly assigned combinations of values for proposal 2. Conjoint experiment on the regulation of pensions in Germany: Preference for reform proposals 1 or 2 with different values for the attributes retirement age, pension level, retirement without deductions, contribution rate and pension bonus for parental leave. Government’s responsibility for the unemployed; government should spend more vs. less money on unemployment; consequences of minim wage on unemployment and poverty in Germany; preferred level of the statutory minimum wage; government’s responsibility for an adequate standard of living for families with children; government should spend more vs. less money on families; priority of cash benefits and tax breaks vs. expansion of childcare in future family policy; government’s responsibility for childcare; government’s responsibility for equal opportunities between men and women at work; opinion on the expansion of the statutory quota of women for corporate management bodies; gender-specific values; opinion on the purchase of CDs with stolen tax information by the federal states; purchase of such tax CDs by the own federal state; donation for charitable organisations; donation claimed in tax declaration; attitude towards tax evasion; evaluation of more influence of taxpayers in the use of their tax payments by the state. Experiment on the social status of citizens (varies for the reference category rich vs. poor): Assessment of statements on rich and poor in Germany with regard to worries, varied life, happiness, success, influence on political decisions, education and educational opportunities, financial security, elite membership and use of transport; self-assessment of social status on a 10 rung ladder. Wheel of Fortune experiment on the respondent´s attention: randomly chosen letter between A and K on a wheel of fortune graphic; calculation of the possible payout to the participants. Satisfaction with democracy; expected own economic situation in one year; European Union: importance of the EU for the respondent (e.g. economic prosperity); probability of further countries leaving the EU; voting behaviour in a referendum on Germany´s membership in the EU (Sunday question). Demography: sex; age (year of birth, categorized); highest educational degree; highest professional qualification; marital status; household size; employment status; assessment of unemployment risk; personal income; German citizenship; frequency of private Internet usage; federal state. Additionally coded: Respondent ID; household ID, GIP; person ID (within the household); year of recruitment (2012, 2014, 2018); interview date; current online status; assignment to experimental groups; activation of JavaScript in the experiment on the social status of citizens. Questionnaire evaluation (interesting, varied, relevant, long, difficult, too personal); assessment of the survey as a whole; respondent made further comments on the questionnaire.