Changes in income poverty and deprivation over time : a comparison of eight European countries from the mid-eighties to the mid-nineties with special attention to the situation of the unemployed ; this paper was also published as working paper 3 of EPUSE (the employment precarity, unemployment and social exclusion project), Oxford, october 1998

All-over in Europe, unemployment became a growing problem from the mid 1980s to the mid 1990s. Nevertheless, the effects on the economical situation of the unemployed and the whole population are quite different in European countries. In this paper we first give a brief overview over the development of unemployment rates in eight member states of the European Union and over the different reactions to provide the social protection of the unemployed. Therefore we look at the social security expenditures, the level of income replacement for the unemployed and recent social policy reforms concerning them. In the second section of the paper, we examine the development of income distribution and poverty taking different poverty lines into consideration. There is no general pattern neither for the relationship of inequality among the unemployed to the whole economically active population nor for the development from the 80s to the 90s. But one can say that in countries with increasing income inequality also poverty is rising (especially in the UK) and that where inequality among the unemployed is less pronounced the proportions of the poor went down from the mid 80s to the mid 90s (France and Ireland). In nearly all countries the risk of being poor is ernormously high for the unemployed, Denmark is the only exception

The Trend in Long-Term Unemployment and Characteristics of Workers Unemployed for Two Years or More

[Excerpt] One of the characteristics of the recession that officially began in December 2007 and ended in June 2009 was the rise in long-term unemployment. The long-term unemployed are often defined as workers who have been looking for work for more than six months. But many workers have been looking for work for longer periods. The first part of this report examines the trend in long-term unemployment using four measures of the long-term unemployed: persons who have been looking for work for more than 26 weeks, more than 52 weeks, more than 78 weeks, and for two years or more. In this report, workers who have been unemployed for two or more years are defined as the “very long-term unemployed.” Because unemployment during the 2007-2009 recession and its aftermath increased more among some groups of workers than others, the second part of the report analyzes selected characteristics of the very long-term unemployed. High long-term unemployment rates raise several issues for Congress. One issue is whether to reauthorize the Emergency Unemployment Compensation (EUC08) program. Other issues include whether to enact policies (1) to increase the demand for workers to reduce the number of long-term unemployed, (2) to provide greater incentives for employers to hire the long-term employed, (3) to create additional incentives for the long-term unemployed to accept new employment, (4) to ensure that the long-term unemployed have the skills that employers need, and/or (5) to improve the match between the skills of the long-term unemployed and the jobs that are available. This report does not address these issues

Surviving Unemployment without State Support: Unemployment and Household Formation in South Africa

High unemployment in many OECD countries is often attributed, at least in part, to the generosity and long duration of unemployment compensation. It is therefore instructive to examine a country where high unemployment exists despite the near complete absence of an unemployment insurance system. In South Africa unemployment stood at 23% in 1997 and the unemployed have no unemployment insurance nor informal sector activities to fall back on. This paper examines how the unemployed are able to get access to resources without support from unemployment compensation. Analysing a household survey from 1995, we find that the household formation response of the unemployed is the critical way in which they assure access to resources. In particular, unemployment delays the setting up of an individual household of young people, in some cases by decades. It also leads to the dissolution of existing households and a return of constituent members to parents and other relatives and friends. Access to state transfers (in particular, non¡ contributory old age pensions) increases the likelihood of attracting unemployed persons to a household. Some unemployed do not benefit from this safety net, and the presence of unemployed members pulls many households supporting them into poverty. We also show that the household formation responses draw some unemployed away from employment opportunities and thus lowers their employment prospects. The paper discusses the implications of these findings for debates about unemployment and social policy in South Africa and in OECD countries

Health Care and the Unemployed

[Excerpt] On a chilly evening in March more than 50 residents of Calumet City Illinois, gathered to hear the findings and recommendations from a survey conducted last fall by the South Suburban Task Force on the Health Impact of Unemployment and Low Income. The Task Force had conducted interviews with unemployed workers in Calumet City and two other south Cook County communities. We wanted to find out the impact unemployment was having on people\u27s health and their ability to get health care. The Task Force\u27s 90-page report, The Health Impact of Unemployment and Low Income, was released in March 1984. It summarized key findings and recommendations based on interviews with unemployed workers and surveys of local physicians, dentists, and health and social service agencies. The Midwest Center for Labor Research (MCLR), along with four local health agencies, conducted the study

Scarring Effects of Remaining Unemployed for Long-Term Unemployed School-Leavers

This study investigates whether and to what extent further unemployment experience for youths who are already long-term unemployed imposes a penalty on subsequent labor market outcomes. We propose a flexible method for analyzing the effect on wages aside of transitions from unemployment and employment within a multivariate duration model that controls for selection on observables and unobservables. We find that prolonging unemployment drastically decreases the chances of finding employment, but hardly affects the quality of subsequent employment. The analysis suggests that negative duration dependence in the job finding rate is induced by negative signaling and not by human capital depreciation.scarring effect of unemployment duration, employment quality, wage in multivariate duration model, selectivity

Unemployment Insurance: Legislative Issues in the 116th Congress

The unemployment insurance (UI) system has two primary objectives: (1) to provide temporary, partial wage replacement for involuntarily unemployed workers and (2) to stabilize the economy during recessions. In support of these goals, several UI programs provide benefits for eligible unemployed worker

The Impact of Monetary Policy on the Distribution and Type of Unemployment

This working paper by William M. Rodgers III employs two widely used approaches to estimate the effects of monetary policy on seven measures of unemployment. Evidence from recursive vector autoregressions and autoregressive distributed lag models that use information on the Federal Reserve's contractionary initiatives indicate that the weeks of unemployment distribution (e.g., less than five weeks) is significantly altered. The number of unemployed increases at all segments of the distribution. However, as a share of total unemployment, the increase is greatest among those with 15 weeks of unemployment or more. The number of job losers on both temporary and permanent layoff rise, with over two-thirds of the increase among permanent job losers. The number of reentrants into the labor force, new entrants, and part-time workers that become unemployed also rises. The share of the unemployed that are job losers rises, while the shares of reentrant, new entrant, and part-time workers that become unemployed falls

Labour Market Transitions in South Africa: What can we learn from matched Labour Force Survey data?

We generate a longitudinal dataset using the rotating panel component of the nationally representative Labour Force Surveys from 2001 to 2003. We then estimate the transition probabilities across different labour market states over a six month period. We find that unemployed searchers are more likely to find employment than the non-searching unemployed. Informal sector workers are more likely to find formal sector employment than the searching unemployed. Whites are more likely to find and remain in formal sector jobs. However, some part of the Black-White unemployment gap arises from unemployed Whites leaving the labour force at a higher rate.

How a Mandatory Activation Program Reduces Unemployment Durations: The Effects of Distance

In an experimental setting some Danish unemployed workers were assigned to an activation program while others were not. Unemployed who were assigned to the activation program found a job more quickly. We show that the activation effect increases with the distance between the place of residence of the unemployed worker and the place where the activation took place. We also find that the quality of the post-unemployment jobs was not affected by the activation program. Both findings confirm that activation programs mainly work because they are compulsory and unemployed don’t like them.Unemployment insurance;unemployment duration;experiment;activation programs