Unemployment Insurance: Supplemental Unemployment Benefit Plans

Abstract The public unemployment insurance program in Sweden has retrenched in terms of its benefit generosity in the last three decades. As a response to this trend, in which an ever-smaller proportion of the previous income of unemployed persons is compensated by public unemployment insurance benefit, complementary income insurance schemes provided by unions have expanded rapidly in the last 15 years, currently covering one half of the working population. What does this change mean for people who need income protection upon unemployment and are more likely to find themselves unemployed or underemployed? By analyzing survey-based benefit recipiency data among retail workers who were unemployed in 2014, this article explores the outcomes of the multi-pillarized unemployment benefit provision system in Sweden. While public unemployment insurance benefit does not fully compensate for the income loss for the majority of retail workers, the promise of a complementary income insurance scheme seems to be illusory for many individuals as they repeatedly oscillate between precarious work and benefits, accompanied by the burden of navigating a complex system.

Front-Loading the Unemployment Benefit: An Empirical Assessment

American Economic Journal Applied Economics ◽

10.1257/app.20180138 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 12 (3) ◽

pp. 140-174 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Attila Lindner ◽

Balázs Reizer

Keyword(s):

Unemployment Insurance ◽

Policy Reform ◽

Behavioral Responses ◽

Sharp Change ◽

Unemployment Benefit ◽

Unemployment Benefits ◽

Cost Increase ◽

Empirical Assessment ◽

Pareto Improving

We estimate the effect of front-loading unemployment benefit payments on nonemployment duration and reemployment wages. Exploiting a sharp change in the path of benefits for those who claimed unemployment benefits after November 1, 2005 in Hungary, we show that nonemployment duration fell by two weeks, while reemployment wages rose by 1.4 percent as a result of front-loading. We show that these behavioral responses were large enough to offset the mechanical cost increase of the unemployment insurance. We argue that our results indicate that benefit front-loading was a Pareto improving policy reform as both unemployed and employed workers were made better off. (JEL D91, J31, J64, J65)

The impact of unemployment insurance on employment norms and income levels: the inevitable drift into 'reduced activity'

Transfer European Review of Labour and Research ◽

10.1177/102425890000600405 ◽

2000 ◽

Vol 6 (4) ◽

pp. 592-611

Author(s):

Carole Tuchszirer

Keyword(s):

Unemployment Insurance ◽

Insurance Fund ◽

Unemployment Benefit ◽

Full Time ◽

Unemployed People ◽

The Unemployed ◽

The Impact ◽

Low Pay ◽

Reduced Activity ◽

Better Than

The aim of this article is to analyse a specific set of support instruments for the unemployed, namely those introduced in 1986 by the bipartite French unemployment insurance fund (UNEDIC) for those in casual employment. Under the new scheme, unemployed people were able to combine a limited income from casual employment with a part of their unemployment benefit, for a period of up to 18 months. Based on the dubious assumption that even precarious employment is better than full-time unemployment, this opportunity was designed to induce the unemployed to take up employment of any kind. The article considers in detail the economic and social context prevailing prior to the introduction of these measures, concluding that precarious, casual employment far from serves as a springboard to permanent employment, but that, on the contrary, it may lead an increasing number of people into underemployment and low-pay traps.

Memoranda on Certain Proposals Relating to Unemployment.Report of the Committee on Procedure and Evidence for the Determination of Claims for Unemployment Insurance Benefit.Determination of Claims for Unemployment Insurance Benefit: Minutes of Evidence before the Committee of the Ministry of Labour.Registry of Friendly Societies: Extracts from the Rules of Registered Trade Unions in Respect for the Seeking of Work as a Condition for the Receipt of Unemployment Benefit.

Social Service Review ◽

10.1086/630738 ◽

1930 ◽

Vol 4 (2) ◽

pp. 340-342

Keyword(s):

Unemployment Insurance ◽

Trade Unions ◽

Unemployment Benefit ◽

Insurance Benefit ◽

Unemployment Insurance Benefit ◽

Friendly Societies

Rise up and Work! Workless People with Impaired Health under Germany's New Activation Regime

Social Policy and Society ◽

10.1017/s1474746410000047 ◽

2010 ◽

Vol 9 (3) ◽

pp. 311-323 ◽

Cited By ~ 8

Author(s):

Martin Brussig ◽

Matthias Knuth

Keyword(s):

Health Status ◽

Unemployment Insurance ◽

Target Population ◽

Unemployment Benefit ◽

Panel Survey ◽

Working Age ◽

Health Related ◽

Unemployment Insurance System ◽

Impaired Health ◽

New System

‘Unemployment Benefit II’ (Arbeitslosengeld II) is the newly created benefit in Germany for workless and needy people of working age who either lack or have exhausted entitlements in the contribution-based unemployment insurance system. This paper explores the effects of an ‘activating’ benefit regime on respondents with inferior health-related capacities by re-analysing data from a recent customer panel survey of this population of recipients. For one, the overall level of activation produced by the new system is differentiated with regard to the health status of the target population. Second, the effects of activation on two employment-related outcomes are estimated, taking health into account.

Active versus passive policies of unemployment: growth and public finance perspectives

South African Journal of Economic and Management Sciences ◽

10.4102/sajems.v12i1.257 ◽

2011 ◽

Vol 12 (1) ◽

pp. 1-10 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Rangan Gupta ◽

Charlotte Du Toit

Keyword(s):

Public Finance ◽

Unemployment Insurance ◽

Overlapping Generations ◽

Unemployment Benefit ◽

Standard Result ◽

Endogenous Growth Model ◽

The Government ◽

Unemployment Policy ◽

Job Finding ◽

Active Policy

This paper develops a general equilibrium endogenous growth model in an overlapping generations framework, and compares, in terms of economic growth, a passive unemployment policy (unemployment insurance) with an active unemployment policy (government expenditures targeted towards improving the job-finding probability of an unemployed). Besides, the standard result of unemployment being growth reducing, under realistic parameterization, we show that the government, under an active policy, can generate higher growth without any compromise on its own consumption, when compared to the unemployment benefit regime. The result, however, depends crucially on the efficiency with which the resources are spent in creating employment.

Can Helping the Sick Hurt the Able? Incentives, Information and Disruption in a Welfare Reform

The Economic Journal ◽

10.1093/ej/uez033 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 129 (624) ◽

pp. 3189-3218

Author(s):

Felix Koenig ◽

Barbara Petrongolo ◽

John Van Reenen ◽

Nitika Bagaria

Keyword(s):

Welfare Reform ◽

Unemployment Insurance ◽

Economic Benefits ◽

Unemployment Benefit ◽

Disability Benefit ◽

Beneficial Effects ◽

Political Costs ◽

Long Run ◽

Short Run ◽

The Uk

Abstract The UK Jobcentre Plus reform sharpened bureaucratic incentives to help disability benefit recipients (relative to unemployment insurance recipients) into jobs. In the long run, the policy raised exits off diasability benefits by 10% and left unemployment outflows roughly unchanged, consistent with (i) beneficial effects of reorganising welfare offices for both groups, and (ii) a shift in bureaucrats' efforts towards getting disability benefit recipients into jobs relative to those on unemployment benefit. The policy accounted for about 30% of the decline in the aggregate disability rolls between 2003 and 2008. In the short run, however, we detect a reduction in unemployment exits and no effect on disability exits, suggesting important initial disruption effects from the big reorganisation. This highlights the difficulty of welfare reform as policymakers may focus on the short-run political costs rather than the long-run economic benefits.

The Effect of Unions on the Receipt of Unemployment Insurance Benefits

ILR Review ◽

10.1177/001979399705000306 ◽

1997 ◽

Vol 50 (3) ◽

pp. 478-492 ◽

Cited By ~ 20

Author(s):

John W. Budd ◽

Brian P. McCall

Keyword(s):

Unemployment Insurance ◽

Longitudinal Survey ◽

Unemployment Duration ◽

Blue Collar ◽

Unemployment Benefit ◽

Blue Collar Workers ◽

Two Factors ◽

White Collar Workers ◽

To Receive ◽

Rule Out

Using National Longitudinal Survey of Youth data for 1979–91, the authors analyze the effect of union representation on the likelihood that individuals eligible for unemployment insurance (UI) benefits actually received those benefits. They find that unions had no statistically significant effect on the probability of benefit receipt among white-collar workers, but among eligible blue-collar workers, those who were laid off from union jobs were roughly 23% more likely than comparable nonunion workers to receive UI benefits. Although the analysis does not identify the reasons for this difference, two factors it appears to rule out as determinants are union-negotiated supplemental unemployment benefit plans and differences between union and nonunion workers in expected unemployment duration.

The Strange Case of British Earnings-Related Unemployment Benefit

Journal of Social Policy ◽

10.1017/s0047279400001847 ◽

1989 ◽

Vol 18 (4) ◽

pp. 527-548 ◽

Cited By ~ 4

Author(s):

John Micklewright

Keyword(s):

Social Policy ◽

Administrative Data ◽

Unemployment Insurance ◽

Subsequent Development ◽

Unemployment Benefit ◽

Income Support ◽

History Of ◽

The Uk ◽

The Unemployed

ABSTRACTThe abolition in 1982 of the Earnings-Related Supplement (ERS) to unemployment benefit, which had been introduced in 1966, left the UK with no element of income support for the unemployed linked to previous earnings. The ERS scheme represents an important case study of economic and social policy but it has been little researched hitherto. The paper examines the history of ERS, showing how the original legislation and subsequent development produced a benefit that bore little relation to schemes in other countries. Unpublished administrative data on the receipt of ERS are used to help document the scheme's failings, and the paper closes by placing ERS within the context of the development of unemployment insurance in Britain.

Does Demanding Activation Work? A Comparative Analysis of the Effects of Unemployment Benefit Conditionality on Employment in 21 Advanced Economies, 1980–2012

European Sociological Review ◽

10.1093/esr/jcz041 ◽

2019 ◽

Author(s):

Carlo Michael Knotz

Keyword(s):

Comparative Analysis ◽

Labour Market ◽

Empirical Research ◽

Unemployment Insurance ◽

Job Search ◽

Unemployment Benefit ◽

Advanced Economies ◽

Micro Level ◽

The Unemployed ◽

Positive Effect

Abstract Whether or not putting the unemployed under greater pressure to seek and accept jobs really helps to raise levels of employment remains a controversially discussed question. Empirical research into this question has so far focused on the micro-level whereas the macro-level effects remain unexplored. This article fills this gap, using a novel comparative dataset on the strictness of job-search and availability requirements and sanction rules for unemployment benefit claimants in 21 countries between 1980 and 2012. It is shown that requiring more active job-search and availability for a wider range of jobs does indeed lead to increased employment, while no evidence for a similar positive effect of tougher sanction rules on employment is found. The data do indicate, however, that sanction rules are themselves a product of adverse labour market conditions. Interactive estimations also suggest a negative moderating influence of tough sanction rules on the effectiveness of stricter conditions, whereas more generous unemployment insurance and assistance benefits appear to strengthen the effects of stricter conditions. Overall, the results suggest that to increase employment, the treatment of the unemployed may be demanding but should not be punitive and should include supportive elements, providing claimants with the resources they need to effectively look for work.