FamData – Creation of a Business Database With Family-Owned and Non-family-Owned Companies

In addition to the annual reports, ad-hoc surveys are conducted several times a year on actual economic policy issues, such as the rise in energy prices or the Bundestag elections. These "Stimmungsmonitore" (Mood Monitors) are designed as compact surveys with short running times. 

Methods and Data Sources

FamData is fed from various data sources. Most of the structural data is taken from the Orbis data base (Bureau van Dijk | Private company information – Orbis (bvdinfo.com)), verified for FamData, and supplemented. In addition, a list of the TOP500 family-owned companies in Germany, compiled by the Institut für Mittelstandsforschung Mannheim and the Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research, was entered into the database at the start of the project and has been updated annually ever since (Die-volkswirtschaftliche-Bedeutung-der-Familienunternehmen-2019_Stiftung_Familienunternehmen.pdf). In addition, company data and individual data from mainly own representative company surveys, information from public annual financial statements, and data from official statistics are regularly used.

Furthermore, as part of FamData, a stable corporate panel for surveys has developed over the years. The panel currently consists of almost 4,000 experts from family and non-family companies, who are usually members of the management team or a leading group of people in this business. They have agreed to participate in the regular surveys (3–4 surveys per year).

In the meantime, the FamData database contains more than 12,000 companies as well as survey results from numerous primary research projects conducted by the Foundation for Family Business in cooperation with the ifo Institute.

FamData also accessible for research

The Family Business Foundation aims to further expand the research field of family businesses and therefore makes the database available to a wider circle of researchers. External researchers who are interested in the survey data due to scientific projects can submit an application to the Family Business Foundation stating the purpose of the research. As the owner of the data, the Family Business Foundation examines the request. After approval by the Family Business Foundation, the data can be used in the LMU-ifo Economics & Business Data Center.

Link to the data offer of the EBDC

Results of the Annual Report of the Foundation for Family Business 2022

The shortage of skilled workers from the company's point of view - effects and possible solutions

Based on a survey of 1,742 German family businesses and non-family businesses, the annual monitor 2022 (Jahresmonitor 2022) analyses how German businesses are affected by the shortage of skilled workers, as well as the associated effects and possible solutions. Overall, the survey results show that the shortage of skilled workers is not limited to individual sectors or regions but is an area-wide problem that affects almost all sectors of the economy. A large majority of the survey participants felt the effects of the shortage of skilled workers, which leads, among other things, to a high effort in filling vacancies. This is associated with a serious increase in personnel costs at almost all the companies surveyed.
What do companies expect from politics? Above all, a comprehensive promotion of young talent combined with targeted career guidance in schools is desired. In addition, more than a third of the respondents consider facilitating immigration to be a suitable political measure.

The companies themselves rely primarily on further training measures for existing staff and the retraining of lateral entrants. Family businesses are more flexible in their training measures than non-family businesses. Furthermore, they want to increase the attractiveness of the jobs by making the working-time schedule more flexible and paying higher salaries.