Social Support Shopping: Evidence from a Regression Discontinuity in Disability Insurance Reform

This paper examines how a change in the generosity of one social assistance program generates spillovers onto other social assistance programs. We exploit an age discontinuity in the stringency of the 1993 Dutch disability reforms to estimate the causal effect of exit from disability insurance (DI) on participation in other social assistance programs. We find strong evidence of "social support shopping": 43 percent of those induced to leave DI due to the reform receive an alternative form of social assistance two years after the implementation of the reform. As a result, for each Euro saved in DI benefits, the government has to spend an extra 60 cents in other social assistance programs. This crowd-out rate grows from 60% to 69% if we also take into account the response of the partners’ of those affected by the DI reform. The crowd-out effect declines over time, but is still 25% eight years after the reform.crowd-out, spillover effects, social insurance, income assistance, welfare, regression discontinuity, administrative data

Measuring the (Income) Effect of Disability Insurance Generosity on Labour Market Participation

We analyze the employment effect of a law that provides for a 36 percent increasein the generosity of disability insurance (DI) for claimants who are, as a result oftheir lack of skills and of the labour market conditions they face, deemed unlikely tofind a job. The selection process for treatment is therefore conditional on having alow probability of employment, making evaluation of its effect intrinsically difficult.We exploit the fact that the benefit increase is only available to individuals aged 55or older, estimating its impact using a regression discontinuity approach. Our firstresults indicate a large drop in employment for disabled individuals who receive theincrease in the benefit. Testing for the linearity of covariates around the eligibility agethreshold reveals that the age at which individuals start claiming DI is not continuous:the benefit increase appears to accelerate the entry rate of individuals aged 55 or over.We obtain new estimates excluding this group of claimants, and find that the policydecreases the employment probability by 8 percent. We conclude that the observedDI generosity elasticity of 0.22 on labour market participation is mostly due to incomeeffects since benefit receipt is not work contingent in the system studied.labour economics ;

Measuring the (Income) Effect of Disability Insurance Generosity on Labour Market Participation

We analyze the employment effect of a law that provides for a 36 percent increase in thegenerosity of disability insurance (DI) for claimants who are, as a result of their lack of skillsand of the labour market conditions they face, deemed unlikely to find a job. The selectionprocess for treatment is therefore conditional on having a low probability of employment, makingevaluation of its effect intrinsically difficult. We exploit the fact that the benefit increase isonly available to individuals aged 55 or older, estimating its impact using a regressiondiscontinuity approach. Our first results indicate a large drop in employment for disabledindividuals who receive the increase in the benefit. Testing for the linearity of covariatesaround the eligibility age threshold reveals that the age at which individuals start claiming DIis not continuous: the benefit increase appears to accelerate the entry rate of individuals aged55 or over. We obtain new estimates excluding this group of claimants, and find that the policydecreases the employment probability by 8 percent. We conclude that the observed DI generosityelasticity of 0.22 on labour market participation is mostly due to income effects since benefitreceipt is not work contingent in the system studied.labour organization;

Measuring the (Income) Effect of Disability Insurance Generosity on Labour Market Participation

We analyze the employment effect of a law that provides for a 36 percent increase in the generosity of disability insurance (DI) for claimants who are, as a result of their lack of skills and of the labour market conditions they face, deemed unlikely to find a job. The selection process for treatment is therefore conditional on having a low probability of employment, making evaluation of its effect intrinsically difficult. We exploit the fact that the benefit increase is only available to individuals aged 55 or older, estimating its impact using a regression discontinuity approach. Our first results indicate a large drop in employment for disabled individuals who receive the increase in the benefit. Testing for the linearity of covariates around the eligibility age threshold reveals that the age at which individuals start claiming DI is not continuous: the benefit increase appears to accelerate the entry rate of individuals aged 55 or over. We obtain new estimates excluding this group of claimants, and find that the policy decreases the employment probability by 8 percent. We conclude that the observed DI generosity elasticity of 0.22 on labour market participation is mostly due to income effects since benefit receipt is not work contingent in the system studied.Disability insurance, labour market participation, income effect, regression discontinuity

Modeling the Effects of Maintenance on the degradation of a Water-feeding Turbo-pump of a Nuclear Power Plant

International audienceThis work addresses the modelling of the effects of maintenance on the degradation of an electric power plant component. This is done within a modelling framework previously proposed by the authors, of which the distinguishing feature is the characterization of the component living conditions by influencing factors (IFs), i.e. conditioning aspects of the component life that influence its degradation. The original fuzzy logic-based modelling framework includes maintenance as an IF; this requires one to jointly model its effects on the component degradation together with those of the other influencing factors. This may not come natural to the experts who are requested to provide the if-then linguistic rules at the basis of the fuzzy model linking the IFs with the component degradation state. An alternative modelling approach is proposed in this work, which does not consider maintenance as an IF that directly impacts on the degradation but as an external action that affects the state of the other IFs. By way of an example regarding the propagation of a crack in a water-feeding turbo-pump of a nuclear power plant, the approach is shown to properly model the maintenance actions based on information that can be more easily elicited from experts

The safety case and the lessons learned for the reliability and maintainability case

This paper examine the safety case and the lessons learned for the reliability and maintainability case

Enforcement of Employment Protection and the hiring behaviour of firms. Evidence from a large Italian region.

This paper investigates the effect of the Employment Protection Legislation (EPL) on the hiring behaviour of the firms when the level of EPL is differentiated by firms size. In this respect, Italy represents an interesting case because workers hired by bigger firms enjoy a stronger protection than workers hired by small firms; the threshold size is fixed by law at 15 employees. A model derives the conditions under which firms decide whether to upsize or not and, in case of upsizing, whether to hire temporary (i.e. workers who are not counted in the threshold, as apprentices in Italy) or permanent workers. The model has been tested using data drawn from the VWH (Veneto Workers History) registered data for firms and workers, from 1982 to 1997, for a large Italian region (i.e. Veneto). Firms close to the threshold are not scared to growth but they are more likely to hire apprentices than permanent workers.Employment Protection, Hiring, Random Effects, Regression Discontinuity Design.

Cascaded Fuzzy Inference System for Overall Equipment Effectiveness of a Manufacturing Process

Overall equipment effectiveness (OEE) is one of the widely accepted performance evaluation methods most commonly employed for measuring the efficiency of a manufacturing process in a manufacturing industry. It plays a most prominent role in improving the efficiency of a manufacturing process which in turn ensures quality, consistency and productivity. The OEE parameters, availability, performance and quality are not single parameters. But these parameters in turn depend on several other parameters which introduce a cascaded effect in OEE computation. The variation in the value of lowest level parameters propagate to the higher levels making the OEE computation a complex process. To cater such situations, in this paper authors propose cascaded fuzzy inference system for measurement of Overall Equipment Effectiveness. In the simplified model proposed by the authors, only few prominent parameters up to two levels are considered. The model can be easily extended to incorporate more parameters and more levels to render it more realistic