Promoting the Well-Being of Immigrant Youth

The well-being of immigrant youth — of the first or second generation — is intimately tied up with their socio-economic status and success; in turn, their success and how immigrant youth relate to the society around them are important elements of social cohesion and well-being for those societies. Institutional settings, in relation to immigrants and to Welfare State structures more broadly, as well as the policies adopted within those settings, vary greatly from one developed country to the next. This opens up the potential for studying key outcomes for immigrant youth in a comparative perspective, and learning about which settings and policies appear to be more versus less effective in promoting their well-being and capitalizing on their potential. This paper sets out a framework for such an analytical exercise, drawing on recent research and monitoring efforts in the related areas of multidimensional well-being, social inclusion/exclusion, and child well-being. It then seeks to place some key findings from the disparate social science research literature on immigration and youth (principally drawing on economics and sociology) within that framework. This serves to bring out both the potential and the difficulties associated with this approach to teasing out “what works” for immigrant youth. In conclusion, the paper points to the major gaps in knowledge and what is required to make progress in learning from disparate country experiences about how best to promote the well-being on immigrant youth.

Income Inequality and Public Policy

This paper briefly summarises the evidence that Ireland has a relatively high level of income inequality, which has been rather stable over time and reflects institutional legacies and choices made in the past. A comparative and over time perspective suggests that modest reductions in income inequality are achievable within the framework of Ireland’s current socioeconomic model, but bringing it below the (EU or OECD) average may well be beyond the capacity of that model. The current financial, fiscal and economic crises require very substantial increases in tax revenue and reductions in state spending. The imperative to close the fiscal deficit provides a window of opportunity to restructure the tax system in a fashion that is not only more economically efficient but also more equitable. Another core aim should be to minimise the number experiencing long-term unemployment and thus the long-term impact of the recession on labour market careers. Once the most immediate needs of the situation are met, this context may provide an opportunity to debate fundamental questions about the role of the state, the extent and nature of social provision and its financing, and the broader relationship between economic performance, the Welfare State, and the underlying goals of Ireland’s socio-economic policy.

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

GP Reimbursement and Visiting Behaviour in Ireland

In Ireland, approximately 30 per cent of the population (“medical cardholders”) receive free GP services while the remainder (“non-medical cardholders”) must pay for each visit. In 1989, the manner in which GPs were reimbursed by the State for their medical cardholder patients was changed from fee-for-service to capitation while other patients continued to pay on a fee-for-service basis. Concerns about supplier-induced demand were in part responsible for this policy change. The purpose of this paper is to examine the extent to which the utilisation of GP services is influenced by the reimbursement system facing GPs, by comparing visiting rates for the two groups before and after this change. Using a difference-in-differences approach on pooled micro-data from 1987, 1995 and 2000, we find that medical card eligibility exerts a consistently positive and significant effect on the utilisation of GP services. However, the differential in visiting rates between medical cardholders and others did not narrow between 1987 and 1995 or 2000, as might have been anticipated if supplier-induced demand played a major role prior to the change in reimbursement system.GP Utilisation; Reimbursement; Supplier-Induced Demand; Difference-in-Differences

Equity in the Utilisation of Health Care in Ireland

This paper analyses the extent of equity of health service delivery across the income distribution in Ireland – that is the extent to which there is equal treatment for equal need irrespective of income. We find that almost all services, apart from dental and optician services, are used more by those at the lower end of the income distribution, but that this group also have the greatest need for health care. The comparison of health need to health care delivery across the income distribution without standardising for confounding factors suggests that those in higher income groups receive more health care for a given health status indicating inequity. However, need for health care is highest among the elderly and this group also tend to be at the bottom of the income distribution. Once we standardise for age, sex and location we find that hospital services are distributed equitably across the income distribution, whereas GP and prescription services tend to be pro-poor (used more by those with lower incomes for a given health status) and dental and optician services tend to be pro-rich (used more by those with higher incomes for a given health status).

Disability and Labour Force Participation in Ireland

The extent and nature of participation in the labour market by persons affected by disability has a multitude of direct and indirect effects on their living standards and quality of life, and so is a critical area for investigation and policy concern. This paper seeks to quantify the effects of disability on labour force participation in Ireland for the first time. Using data from the Living in Ireland Survey, 2000 and the Quarterly National Household Survey Disability Module 2002, we look at the relationship between participation and self-reported disability. The results show that those individuals reporting a severely limiting condition have a much lower probability of participation in the labour force than others, and this continues to be the case having controlled for other characteristics such as age, education and marital status. The reporting of such conditions itself may not be exogenous, however, and this is a priority for further research.

Evaluating the Impact of a National Minimum Wage: Evidence from a New Survey of Firms

In April 2000 the Irish government introduced a national minimum wage of £4.40 an hour. This paper uses data from a specially designed panel survey of firms to estimate the labour market effects of this change. Initial results show that employment growth among firms with low wage workers prior to the legislation was not significantly different to that for firms not affected by the legislation. However, this measure of the minimum wage bite is likely to overestimate the number of firms affected by the legislation. When we use a more refined measure of the minimum wage bite, which takes account of general wage growth in the economy we find the minimum wage may have had a statistically significantly negative effect on employment for the small number of firms most severely affected by the legislation.

GINI DP 19: The EU 2020 poverty target

As part of its 2020 Strategy adopted in 2010, the EU has set a number of headline targets including one for poverty reduction over the next decade. This is a major development in the role accorded to social inclusion in the EU, and thus very important at the level of principle. However, the specific way the target itself has been framed, and the implications for approaches to implementing it, also merit careful consideration. The population identified in framing the target is persons in the member states either below a country-specific relative income poverty threshold, above a material deprivation threshold, or in a “jobless” household. This paper presents an in-depth analysis and critique of the way that target is formulated on both conceptual and empirical grounds and documents the consequence for our understanding of both cross-national and socio-economic patterning of poverty. The paper concludes with a discussion of alternative approaches to combining low income and material deprivation to identify those most in need from a poverty reduction perspective.

WHAT HAS HAPPENED TO REPLACEMENT RATES? ESRI Working Paper No. 76, May 1996

Financial incentives to take up and stay in work, and the impact of the tax and social welfare systems on these incentives, have become a major preoccupation of Irish policy-makers. Recent Budgets have highlighted measures to "reward work" through income tax and PRSI relief for the low paid, and one aim of the expert working group set up to advise on the integration of the tax and social welfare systems is to point towards ways of improving work incentives. Empirical studies of work incentives generally measure the financial incentive facing individuals in the form of replacement rates, the ratio of income when unemployed to income when in work.1 In calculating replacement rates, choices about precisely what is to be included in the numerator or the denominator have to be made and can matter. More fundamentally, though, different approaches to deriving replacement rates, relying on different types of data, can be distinguished and may not tell the same story about the situation at a particular point in time or changes over time. This paper sets out the alternative approaches which have been used to measure Irish replacement rates, compares the pattern they show for these rates over time, and assesses the implications for our picture of how work incentives have evolved and for measurement practice

A Panel Data Analysis Of The Utilisation Of GP Services In Ireland: 1995-2001. ESRI Working Paper No. 13, n.d.

The extent to which the cost of obtaining health care influences the utilisation of GP and other health services is a frequently analysed topic. A key issue concerns the extent to which access to private health insurance and/or eligibility for free public health services results in differences in utilisation that cannot be explained by differences in need factors such as age, gender or health status. Ireland is an interesting case study in this regard as only 30 per cent of the population are eligible for free GP consultations; the remainder of the population must pay the full price. Using panel data from 1995 to 2001 on GP visits in Ireland, this paper applies a random effects approach to count data in an attempt to determine the factors influencing GP visiting patterns, with a particular focus on the role of eligibility for free public health services