Means-tested Social Assistance (SA) benefits play an important role as social protection floors sup-porting households in financial difficulties. This paper presents evidence on the patterns of SA benefit re-ceipt in a selection of OECD and EU countries. It provides an overview of the role of SA...

We contribute new evidence about earnings and labour market volatility in Britain over the period 1992–2008, for women as well as men, and provide transatlantic comparisons (Most research about volatility refers to earnings volatility for US men.). Earnings volatility declined slightly for...

We examine the determinants of low income transitions using first-order Markov models that control for initial conditions effects (those found to be poor in the base year may be a non-random sample) and for attrition (panel retention may also be non-random). The model estimates, derived from...

We model transitions between unemployment, low-paid and high-paid employment by British men using a first order Markov model with endogenous switching that also takes into account the endogeneity of initial conditions, selection into employment, and sample attrition. Our estimates indicate that...

We analyse the dynamics of social assistance benefit (SA) receipt among working-age adults in Britain between 1991 and 2005. The decline in the annual SA receipt rate was driven by a decline in the SA entry rate rather than by the SA exit rate (which also declined). We examine the determinants...

In most OECD countries, the gap between rich and poor is at its highest level since 30 years. Today, the richest 10 per cent of the population in the OECD area earn 9.5 times the income of the poorest 10 per cent; in the 1980s this ratio stood at 7:1 and has been rising continuously ever since....