Poverty and Employability Effects of Workfare Programs in Argentina

Abstract

SummaryIn 1993 Argentina began implementing workfare programs, and workfare has become a central public policy starting 2002 when the government increased the number of beneficiaries from 100,000 to 2 million people in a country of 38 million. We explore targeting, poverty and employability effects of workfare before 2002 based on the permanent household survey (EPH). We find that the program was pro-poor although more than one third of participants did not satisfy the eligibility criteria. Our estimates suggest that the income of participants increased during treatment -particularly for women -indicating beneficial short run poverty effects. However, the long run effects of the program are not obvious due to selection on treatment completion. We present evidence suggesting that -for a large fraction of participants-the program generated dependency and did not increase their human capital.

Is Informal Sector Work an Alternative to Workfare Benefits? The Case of Pre‐program Expansion and Economic Crisis

“…However, this just restricts the non-participant population to a population that fulfils the general eligibility criteria of not earning a certain amount of income before the program (in this case at or below the minimum wage) and does not have access to the program. This criticism would also apply to other studies on program evaluation as well, which restrict comparison groups from the general survey population in some form, for instance to labor force participants, before the analysis (Galasso and Ravallion 2003;Ronconi, Sanguinetti and Fachelli 2004).…”

“…11 This section describes a more narrow literature on workfare programs and informality in Argentina and highlights the existing gaps in the literature with respect to the empirical analysis of the low-waged informal and self-employed labor 11 For evaluations of the various workfare programs and their dimensions on employment and poverty: Ravallion 2003, 2004;Galasso, Ravallion and Salvia 2001;Ravallion 1999, 2003;Ravallion, Galasso, Lazo and Philipp 2001;Ronconi, Sanguinetti and Fachelli 2004;Ronconi, Sanguinetti, Fachelli, Casazza and Franceschelli 2006;Gasparini, Haimovich and Oliveri 2006;Almeida and Galasso 2007;Iturriza, Bedi and Sparrow 2008). For the political economy literature: The distribution of benefits is analyzed on various levels.…”

“…2003Ronconi et al 2004Ronconi et al , 2006Gasparini, Haimovich and Olivieri 2006). In Table 3 I include these variables in a probit regression.…”

Poverty, Inequality and Migration in Latin Amerika

“…Also it is important to bear in mind that there are other transfers available outside Plan Jefes. For an impact evaluation of Plan Jefes see Galasso and Ravallion (2003) or Ronconi et al (2004).…”

“…2 Galasso and Ravallion (2003) evaluate the impact of the program with administrative data and the Argentine household surveys and conclude that although partial problems with coverage existed the program compensated many losers from the crisis and prevented extreme poverty. Also Ronconi et al (2004) look at the poverty and employment impact of Argentine workfare programs and conclude that the programs were pro-poor and helped the participants increase income and reduce poverty. They concluded that the programs aided participants to join the labor market and find a job.…”