This paper is the first in a series aimed at analyzing disability employment policy, and developing recommendations for policy reform in middle income countries. As the first paper in this series, this study provides a general overview of the relationship between disability and employment,...

This report makes an international comparison of the tax treatment of funded pensions and finds that the expenditure-tax system is the best way of taxing pensions because it does not distort the decision whether to consume now or save and consume in the future, unlike the comprehensive income...

This paper reviews the first generation of Social Safety Net Assessments (SSNAs) conducted in Central America, including those of Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua. The World Bank supports SSNAs to help identify strengths and weaknesses in social protection policies and...

Ratcheting Labor Standards (RLS) is a regulatory alternative that aims to improve the social performance of firms in the global economy. Under RLS, firms disclose to a certified monitor, information on their social performance, minimally including working conditions, hours, and wages. The...

While targeting can effectively channel resources to the poor, implementation details matter tremendously to distributive outcomes. Several key factors affect performance, including: data collection processes; information management; household assessment mechanisms; institutional arrangements;...

Brazilian youth today face enormous difficulties in penetrating the labor market, a situation much different from the one 25 years ago. While females have entered the labor market and increased their employment rate many are unemployed. Youth unemployment reached 19.1 percent in 2002; up from 4.5...

This paper looks at youth labour market trends concentrating on developing and transition countries. Questions relating to the integration of young people into decent work have in recent times once again begun to occupy a central position in Government Policy issues. Recently coordinated efforts...

Social risk management (SRM) is a new means of looking at poverty, risk, and risk management that was recently presented in the World Bank's Social Protection Strategy Paper. The SRM perspective addresses how vulnerable households can be helped to better manage risks and become less susceptible...

The authors use a unique data set on adult earnings in Brazil to study how child labor affects adult earnings through its impacts on work experience, years of schooling, and human capital attained per year of schooling. Adding up these positive and negative effects, their empirical findings...

The paper describes and evaluates unemployment insurance savings accounts (UISAs) a relatively new and not well-known way of providing unemployment benefits. The UISAs reduce work disincentives by allowing recipients to keep their own unused unemployment contributions, and offer the possibility...