Are Recipients of Social Assistance 'Benefit Dependent'? Concepts, Measurement and Results for Selected Countries

Arbeitspapier

Means-tested Social Assistance (SA) benefits play an important role as social protection floors supporting households in financial difficulties. This paper presents evidence on the patterns of SA benefit receipt in a selection of OECD and EU countries. It provides an overview of the role of SA benefits in social protection systems and assesses the generosity of benefit payments. It then studies the dynamics of SA benefit receipt based on micro-level data describing trends in aggregate receipt and transition rates and presenting new evidence on spell durations and repeat spells. The final part of the paper summarizes recent empirical evidence on state dependence (or 'scarring effects') in benefit receipt and discusses its possible sources and policy implications.

Object Details

• Language: Englisch

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: Series: IZA Discussion Papers ; No. 8786

Classification and Topics

• Classification: Wirtschaft ; Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty: Government Programs; Provision and Effects of Welfare Programs ; Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers: General ; Unemployment: Models, Duration, Incidence, and Job Search ; Single Equation Models; Single Variables: Panel Data Models; Spatio-temporal Models
• Subject: social assistance ; welfare benefits ; state dependence ; benefit dependence ; scarring

Contributors, Places and Time

• Event: Geistige Schöpfung
• (who): Immervoll, Herwig ; Jenkins, Stephen P. ; Königs, Sebastian
• Event: Veröffentlichung
• (who): Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA)
• (where): Bonn
• (when): 2015

Further information

• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/107575
• Last update: 10.03.2025, 11:42 AM CET