Replication material for: “Unemployment Insurance and the Family: Heterogeneous effects of benefit generosity on re-employment and economic precarity.”

Replication material for: “Unemployment Insurance and the Family: Heterogeneous effects of benefit generosity on re-employment and economic precarity.”

Authors

Ursina Kuhn (FORS - Swiss Centre of Expertise in the Social Sciences)
Debra Hevenstone (Bern University of Applied Sciences )
Leen Vandecasteele (University of Lausanne)
Samin Sepahniya (Bern University of Applied Sciences and University of Applied Sciences and Arts Northwestern Switzerland)
Dorian Kessler (Bern University of Applied Sciences )

Publication year

2024

How to cite

Kuhn, U., Hevenstone, D., Vandecasteele, L., Sepahniya, S., Kessler, D. (2024). Replication material for: Unemployment Insurance and the Family: Heterogeneous effects of benefit generosity on re-employment and economic precarity. FORS - Swiss Centre of Expertise in the Social Sciences. https://doi.org/10.25597/tm2k-jf98

Publisher

FORS - Swiss Centre of Expertise in the Social Sciences

Abstract

We investigate how unemployment insurance generosity impacts re-employment and economic precarity by family type. Using Swiss longitudinal administrative data on income and household composition, and a regression discontinuity design for potential benefit duration, we examine differences between single households, primary earners, secondary earners, equal earners, as well as differences by gender and those with and without children. Overall, less generous unemployment insurance (shorter potential benefit duration) speeds-up re-employment, but increases the risk of economic precarity, though the extent of these effects differs by family type. We find that shorter unemployment benefit duration increases economic precarity during the period with benefit cuts, especially for primary earners and those with children, groups with high financial responsibility for the household. There are no clear effects on precarity in the longer term. With respect to re-employment, we find that shorter benefit entitlement increases re-employment for all family types during the period with benefit cuts, while longer-term effects are stronger for single households, secondary and equal earners and people without children; i.e. those with lower financial responsibility for the household. We argue that those with high financial responsibility face large employment pressure regardless of unemployment insurance rules while those with lower financial responsibility have greater capacity to react to unemployment insurance rules.

Keywords

unemployment
family
gender
household
welfare state
unemployment insurance
poverty
potential benefit duration

Description of the material

1. Readme: List of data sources and variables; information on legislation; list of code files/scripts
2. Statistical code: R script (1 file) and Stata do-files (14 files)

Geolocation

Switzerland, Europe

Remarks

Data Source: Swiss Federal Administration Registry data.
Please see readme file in the downloadable .zip file for further information on the used data.
Publication link: tbd

Publication

No. 8