Elected representatives in many countries are legally allowed to carry out (un)paid jobs in addition to their political mandate, often referred to as 'moonlighting'. Despite the important selection and incentive effects such outside positions might engender, academic studies evaluating the prevalence, desirability and/or consequences of politicians' moonlighting have remained relatively scarce; often due to severe data restrictions. In recent years, however, more stringent disclosure rules have increased data availability, and large-sample analyses are becoming increasingly feasible. Besides surveying recent empirical contributions to this developing research field, this paper also outlines unresolved issues and thereby develops an agenda for future enquiry.

This article examines whether sex matters with respect to a type of legislator behaviour that has thus far been neglected in the literature analysing the distinctive nature of female and male legislators: parliamentarians' outside interests. Using data for 614 German MPs, our analysis confirms that female MPs on average hold fewer outside jobs than men -especially in private-sector functions. We also find that individual characteristics such as political experience, having (young) children, and age reflect sources of this divergence. These findings and their implications are discussed in the light of extensive research on sex and gender effects in other political and labour market settings. (104 words)

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This article statistically analyzes the moonlighting activities of members of the German Bundestag. In contrast to popular prejudices about "the political class," the data reveal that there are considerable differences among the 613 MPs regarding (i) the number and type of ancillary activities and (ii) the amount of outside income. Moreover a multiple regression analysis shows that the factors party affiliation, duration of parliamentary membership, age, and number of children contribute to the explanation of the observable differences. However, the empirical findings for MPs' outside income have to be viewed with skepticism as the official disclosure rules do not create full income transparency. Copyright 2009 die Autoren Journal compilation 2009, Verein für Socialpolitik und Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

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