Work norms and unemployment

Kolm, Ann-Sofie

doi:10.1016/j.econlet.2005.05.008

Cited by 10 publications

(11 citation statements)

References 4 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…In this paper, we have added to the evidence concerning the importance of social behaviour or social comparison in the use of social insurance. For example, see Clark (), Conley and Topa (), Topa (), and Kolm () regarding unemployment insurance, and see Ichino and Maggi (), Lindbeck et al . (), and Hesselius et al .…”

Section: Conclusion and Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Social Behaviour in Work Absence*

Hesselius

Johansson

Vikström

2013

Scandinavian J Economics

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

By making use of a large-scale randomized experiment, we test whether social behaviour is important for work absence due to illness. The individuals treated in the experiment were exposed to less monitoring of their eligibility to collect sickness insurance benefits, which sharply increased their non-monitored work absence. This exogenous variation is exploited in two complementary analyses. In both analyses, we find significant social-behaviour effects. Using detailed data, we conclude that the social-behaviour effects most likely stem from fairness concerns.

show abstract

Section: Conclusion and Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Social Behaviour in Work Absence*

Hesselius

Johansson

Vikström

2013

Scandinavian J Economics

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…We consider unemployment benefits and old age survival pensions, both financed by taxing employed workers. We find that social norms increase the likelihood of multiplicity of equilibria (as in Lindbeck et al, 1999, or Kolm, 2005. We also find that workers' social norms, creating a positive participation externality, facilitate the emergence of local indeterminacy and of flip bifurcations 2 for plausible values of the unemployment rate, constituting therefore a source of business cycles driven by self-fulfilling volatile expectations, i.e.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 69%

Employment Dynamics and Redistributive Policies Under Workers' Social Norms

2014

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Employment Dynamics and Redistributive Policies underWorkers' Social Norms *We study employment dynamics using an OLG model with unemployment benefits and universal old-age survival pensions, both financed by taxing employed workers. The novelty is that we explicitly introduce workers' social norms that shape both the individual participation decision of workers and wage bargaining. We find that social norms increase the likelihood of multiplicity of equilibria and somewhat facilitate the emergence of indeterminacy and flip bifurcations, constituting therefore a source of business cycles driven by self-fulfilling volatile expectations, i.e. sunspots. We also find that, in the presence of strong social norms, standard policy recommendations that advocate a decrease in unemployment benefits in order to boost employment are no longer valid. Indeed, our simulation results show that the opposite will happen for empirically plausible levels of the unemployment rate.

show abstract

“…Depending on the level of norm-conformity, social interactions in a specific region determine the conviction that people should earn their own income and therefore, in turn, determine the non-pecuniary costs of failing to comply with the social work norm. Since the regional strength of norm adherence also affects unemployment levels, this relationship contributes to explaining different unemployment equilibria in otherwise similar communities (Kolm, 2005).…”

Section: The Social Work Norm and The Labour Marketmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Economic researchers, such as Stutzer and Lalive (2004) or Kolm (2005), argue that regional unemployment interacts with the pressure on the affected individual to comply with such a norm, resulting in "weak norm" and "strong norm" communities, with correspondingly different levels of unemployment. Apart from this argument, however, the relevance of the social work norm to labour market economics and policy-making has not yet been considered comprehensively, despite the important implications to be drawn simply from its existence and the probable consequences of people suffering psychologically from a dependency on benefits.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Employed But Still Unhappy? On the Relevance of the Social Work Norm

Chadi¹

2012

Schmollers Jahrbuch

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. This series presents research findings based either directly on data from the German SocioEconomic Panel Study (SOEP) or using SOEP data as part of an internationally comparable data set (e.g. CNEF, ECHP, LIS, LWS, CHER/PACO). SOEP is a truly multidisciplinary household panel study covering a wide range of social and behavioral sciences: economics, sociology, psychology, survey methodology, econometrics and applied statistics, educational science, political science, public health, behavioral genetics, demography, geography, and sport science. Terms of use: Documents inThe decision to publish a submission in SOEPpapers is made by a board of editors chosen by the DIW Berlin to represent the wide range of disciplines covered by SOEP. There is no external referee process and papers are either accepted or rejected without revision. Papers appear in this series as works in progress and may also appear elsewhere. They often represent preliminary studies and are circulated to encourage discussion. Citation of such a paper should account for its provisional character. A revised version may be requested from the author directly. AbstractIn the modern welfare state, people who cannot make a living usually receive financial assistance from public funds. Accordingly, the so-called social work norm against living off other people is violated, which may be the reason why the unemployed are so unhappy. If so, however, labour market concepts based on the notion of promoting low-paid jobs that are subsidised if necessary with additional payments would appear far less favourable. It could be that people are employed, but still unhappy. Using German panel data, this paper examines the relevance of the social work norm and finds a significant disutility effect of living off public funds. Although this is true for employed people as well, the results show that the individual is generally better off having a job that requires additional assistance, than having no job at all. On the other hand, such policies as the recent German labour market reforms can trigger undesired side-effects, if policy-makers ignore the issue of the social work norm."We have established a functioning low-wage sector, and, in terms of social benefits, we have placed special emphasis on incentives to take up employment."

show abstract

Work norms and unemployment

Cited by 10 publications

References 4 publications

Social Behaviour in Work Absence*

Social Behaviour in Work Absence*

Employment Dynamics and Redistributive Policies Under Workers' Social Norms

Employed But Still Unhappy? On the Relevance of the Social Work Norm

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About