Activation policies to promote self-sufficiency among recipients of welfare and other types of benefits are becoming more common in many welfare states. We evaluate a law change in Norway making welfare receipt conditional on participation in an activation program for all welfare recipients...

Unemployment not only causes material hardship but can also affect an individual's sense of identity (i.e. their perception of belonging to a specific social group) and, consequently, feelings of personal happiness and subjective well-being. Labor market policies designed to help the unemployed...

Mit dem "Teilhabechancengesetz" wurden zum Jahresbeginn 2019 die Instrumente "Eingliederung von Langzeitarbeitslosen" (§16e SGB II) sowie "Teilhabe am Arbeitsmarkt" (§16i SGB II) eingeführt. Beide Instrumente richten sich gleichermaßen an langzeitarbeitslose Leistungsberechtigte, die auch...

In this paper, we explore ways of combining experimental data and non-experimental methods to estimate the differential effects of components of training programs. We show how data from a multi-site experimental evaluation in which subjects are randomly assigned to any treatment versus a control...

Workfare programs are one of the most popular social protection and employment policy instruments in the developing world. They evoke the promise of efficient targeting, as well as immediate and lasting impacts on participants’ employment, earnings, skills and behaviors. This paper evaluates...

Welfare recipients in Germany are allowed to take up supplementary jobs while receiving welfare. The possibility of having a supplementary job was introduced to reduce welfare dependency and facilitate successful labor market integration. In the present study, we use the German Panel Study...

Workfare programs are one of the most popular social protection and employment policy instruments in the developing world. They evoke the promise of efficient targeting, as well as immediate and lasting impacts on participants’ employment, earnings, skills and behaviors. This paper evaluates...

This paper estimates a structural model of job search which accounts for utility costs and benefits linked to mandatory reemployment programs. The estimation uses data from a randomized experiment which generates exogenous variation in the threat of program participation. I use the compensating...

Food-based transfer programs have the potential to change diets or alter basic crop mixes. This study empirically investigates the associations between participating in food-for-work (FFW) programs and the diversity of food consumption and production. Four waves of panel data from the Tigray...

The Income Maintenance Experiments have received renewed attention due to growing international interest in a Basic Income. Proponents viewed a Negative Income Tax as a replacement for traditional welfare with stronger work incentives and reduced poverty. However, existing labor supply estimates...

Mit dem "Teilhabechancengesetz" wurden zum Jahresbeginn 2019 die Instrumente "Eingliederung von Langzeitarbeitslosen" (§16e SGB II) sowie "Teilhabe am Arbeitsmarkt" (§16i SGB II) eingeführt. Beide Instrumente richten sich gleichermaßen an langzeitarbeitslose Leistungsberechtigte, die auch...

We analyse the existence and underlying mechanisms of neighbourhood effects in welfare-to-work transitions. The analysis is based on Luxembourg social security longitudinal data, which covers the period 2001-2015 and provides precise information at the postcode level, corresponding mostly to...

Welfare-to-work programs have been extensively studied, in most cases as a single “black box”. Our structural dynamic model and the unique data we use enable us to open this box and shed light on the mechanisms through which the various components of the program operate. We are able to...

So-called activation policies aiming at bringing jobless people into work have been a central component of welfare reforms across OECD countries during the last decades. Such policies combine restrictive and enabling programs, but their characteristic feature is that also enabling programs are...

The Clinton administration has made job training and skill upgrading a major priority. Secretary of Labor Robert Reich has already presented a bold program for skill enhancement drawing on a new consensus in certain circles of the social science and policy communities about the need to upgrade...

Workfare programs are one of the most popular social protection and employment policy instruments in the developing world. They evoke the promise of efficient targeting, as well as immediate and lasting impacts on participants' employment, earnings, skills and behaviors. This paper evaluates...

Recent welfare reforms are prompting some state and local welfare agencies to use temporary help service firms to help place welfare recipients into jobs. Concerns have arisen that these jobs are more likely to pay low wages, provide fewer benefits, and offer less stability. We explore the...

This paper reviews the U.S. welfare reform efforts over the 1990s and the effects of these reforms to date. Seven "lessons" of potential interest to European observers are discussed, with particular attention to the conclusions of more recent research. Such research indicates, for example, that...

The impacts of introducing work requirements for welfare recipients are studied in an efficiency wage model. If the workfare package is not mandatory, it will reduce employment, profits, and utility levels of employed and unemployed workers. In contrast, mandatory effort requirements will...

This paper analyses crucial design features of unemployment insurance (UI) policies. We examine three different means of improving the efficiency of UI: the duration of benefit payments, monitoring in conjunction with sanctions, and workfare. To that end we develop a quantitative model of...

Workfare proposals concentrate on the work incentives for welfare recipients, thus focusing on the labor supply side. This paper analyzes the effects workfare has on labor demand when the labor market is unionized. As workfare reduces the number of recipients of public financial assistance, a...

This paper makes three contributions to the literature on program evaluation. First, we construct a model that is well-suited to conduct equilibrium policy experiments and we illustrate effectiveness of general equilibrium models as tools for the evaluation of social programs. Second, we...

We analyse the effects of active social policy (ASP) on the dynamics of welfare dependence. We evaluate the impact of various ASP measures (employment and training) on the duration of welfare spells and subsequent employment spells, based on data from Denmark. The results show that employment...

Despite the popularity of public works programs in developing countries, there is virtually no evidence on the value of the infrastructure they generate. This paper attempts to start filling this gap in the context of the PSNP – a largescale program implemented in Ethiopia since 2005. Under...

This paper reports on a randomized evaluation of an earnings subsidy offered to long-term welfare recipients in Canada. The program -- known as the Self-Sufficiency Project (SSP) -- provides a supplement equal to one-half of the difference between a target earnings level and a participant's...

We have used a unique longitudinal database that incorporates information from diverse administrative and research sources to examine the impact of the early stages of welfare reform on poor working families who do not receive cash assistance. Our data are for 2791 working poor families from...

As the COVID-19 pandemic takes a catastrophic toll on lives and livelihoods across the United States, the harshest impact of the unpredictable virus has disproportionately fallen with foreseeable accuracy on Black, immigrant, poor, and elderly people, who are most likely to live and work in...

In this paper we develop a dynamic structural life-cycle model of labor supply behavior which fully accounts for the effect of income tax and transfers on labor supply incentives. Additionally, the model recognizes the demand side driven rationing risk that might prevent individuals from...

The principal means by which individuals and families achieve economic self-sufficiency is through labor market earnings. As a consequence, it is natural for policy makers to look to interventions that increase the ability of individuals and families to achieve an adequate standard of living...

Social assistance in Germany reduces the incentive to work. The U. S. Welfare to Work Programme tries to avoid such disincentives. It consists essentially of two elements: the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) for employees in low wage occupations and a Workfare model. The EITC and the Workfare...

Social assistance to the poor is increasingly subject to compulsory work requirements in Germany. Municipalities have started to offer temporary employment in their job-creation companies to claimants who are able to work. These claimants earn wages and social insurance contributions if they...

A central concern in economics is to understand the interplay between institutions and labor markets. In this paper we argue that laboratory experiments are a powerful tool for studying labor market institutions. One of the most important advantages is the ability to implement truly exogenous...

The Self-Sufficiency Project (SSP) was a Canadian research and demonstration project that attempted to "make work pay" for long-term income assistance (IA) recipients by supplementing their earnings. The long-term goal of SSP was to get lone parents permanently off IA and into the paid labour...

Studies examining the effectiveness of welfare-to-work programs present findings that are mixed and sometimes at odds, in part due to research design, data, and methodological limitations of the studies. We aim to substantially improve on past approaches to estimate program effectiveness by...

In October 1999, the British government enacted the Working Families' Tax Credit, a generous tax credit aimed at encouraging work among low-income families with children. This paper uses longitudinal data collected between 1991 and 2001 to evaluate the effect of this reform on single mothers. We...

This paper reviews the evidence on welfare time limits in the United States. It primarily refers to experimental and econometric evaluations. Time limits affect welfare recipients both before and after their limits are reached. Time limits reduce welfare receipt and increase employment before...

This paper attempts to uncover the effects of a welfare-to-work programme that acts as a wage subsidy on wage growth by exploiting an expansion to this welfare programme in the UK. The conventional wisdom is that such programmes trap recipients into low wage, low quality work - this comes from...

This paper reviews the evidence of specific mandatory work-first programmes (job search assistance and workfare) for welfare recipients in the United States, the United Kingdom, Denmark, the Netherlands and Germany. It primarily refers to experimental and econometric evaluations. The...

This paper looks at the effect of India's flagship workfare program, the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS), on domestic violence via its role as social insurance and a means for improving women's say in household decisions. Using a moral hazard theoretical framework, I...

Using establishment-level employment and operating data, we examine the impact of the Indian government's employment guarantee program on labor and firm behavior. We exploit the staggered implementation of the program for identification and find that the program led to a 10% reduction in...

In 2012, HUD commissioned a national random assignment evaluation of the Family-Self Sufficiency (FSS) program's impacts on labor market and other quality of life outcomes for households receiving Housing Choice Vouchers (HCVs). The FSS program has two key components: i) funding for Public...

The Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program provides cash assistance to very-low-income families with children. Application procedures to receive TANF benefits, however, often involve substantial transaction costs likely to reduce take-up. We estimate, through a randomized...