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The administration of social assistance benefits is devolved to local agencies in Belgium, which raises questions about how much variation in spell lengths of benefit receipt is associated with differences across agencies. We address this issue by analysing the monthly hazard of benefit exit using administrative record data for 14,270 individuals in 574 welfare agencies. Our random-effects model allows for differences in both the observed and unobserved characteristics of beneficiaries and of local agencies. There are large differences in median benefit duration for individuals serviced by different welfare agencies: the range is from two months to more than 24 months. We find strong associations between beneficiary characteristics (sex, age, foreign nationality, citizenship acquisition, work history and being a student) and spell length. The estimates show higher odds of exiting social assistance receipt in bigger municipalities and in agencies which provide more generous supplementary assistance, and also strong evidence of shorter episodes in agencies where active labour market programme participation rates are higher.

Nationally, the welfare caseload declined by more than 50% between 1994 and 2000. Considerable research has been devoted to understanding what caused this decline. Much of the literature examining these changes has modeled the total caseload (the stock) directly. Klerman and Haider (forthcoming) model the underlying flows and show analytically and empirically that previous methods are likely to be biased because they ignore important dynamics. However, due to their focus on the bias of the stock models, they present only limited results concerning the robustness of their findings and utilize only a single measure of economic conditions, the unemployment rate. This paper examines the robustness of the basic stock-flow model developed in Klerman and Haider (forthcoming), considering both richer dynamic specifications and richer measures of economic condition. We find that more complex dynamic specifications do not change the substantive conclusions, but richer measures of the economy do. While a model that only includes the unemployment rate attributes about half of the California caseload decline between 1995 and 1998 to the economy, models that incorporate richer measures of the economy attribute more than 90% of the decline to the economy.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the job search probability in welfare receipt over time for men and women in different household constellations, because it is a major concern in welfare states that long-term receipt is driven by recipients’ low job search activity.

The paper analyses the likelihood to search for a job for a sample of unemployed recipients of means-tested welfare benefits in Germany. Data basis is the panel study “Labour Market and Social Security” (PASS), and growth curve models are applied in this study.

Job search probability differs by household constellation and gender directly after the onset of welfare receipt; differences are less distinct for changes in job search probability over time. Only welfare recipients without children show a pronounced decline in search probability.

There is no evidence that welfare recipients’ overall cease to search for a job by and by. Financial incentives alone cannot stimulate the job search of welfare recipients, when the diverse motives of male and female recipients in various household constellations are not considered as well.

This paper is the first to study the long-term development in the job search probability and gender differences by household constellations.

Long-term welfare recipients in the Netherlands are either long-term unemployed or part-time employed in jobs that generate incomes below the subsistence level. The question is whether reintegration policies aiming at their return to – a fulltime – job should consider individual social network factors besides psychological and human capital factors. The purpose of this paper is to investigate welfare recipients’ job search behaviour, in particular how individual social capital is distributed, and whether it is related to job search activities.

Standardised and structured interviews were conducted with 189 long-term unemployed welfare recipients. An adapted version of the Resource Generator instrument was used to measure individual access to social capital.

Social capital scales measuring domestic social resources, status-related social resources, expert advice on regulations and financial matters, and advice on finding a job were developed and psychometrically tested. Status-related social resources were more easily accessible to men and higher educated persons. Advice on finding a job was more easily accessible to recently unemployed individuals. Domestic social resources were less accessible to ethnic minorities. Persons with more social capital, specifically status-related social resources and advice in finding a job, showed more active job search behaviour.

The differences in job search activities between respondents with more social capital and those with less social capital were present but to a small degree, and therefore there is no argument for reintegration activities to focus on enlarging social capital.

This study addresses the instrumental functions of the social network by multidimensionally scrutinising the resources that social relationships provide access to.

Previous research emphasises the need for preventative interventions to reduce mental health problems among disadvantaged children and adolescents. There is however little consensus concerning the delivery and impacts of such interventions particularly non-clinical, arts-based models delivered within community settings. The purpose of this paper is to begin to address this deficit through a qualitative assessment of the short- to medium-term impacts to participants’ mental and emotional wellbeing within Sistema Scotland’s Big Noise orchestral programme.

Semi-structured interviews, observation, participant drawing exercise, participatory filmmaking, focus group and analysis of programme engagement were undertaken to examine the mental and emotional wellbeing impacts of the programme which are observable at this early stage of programme delivery and participants’ lives.

The qualitative findings indicate that participation in the Big Noise programme enhances participant mental and emotional wellbeing in three ways; first, the happiness and enjoyment of taking part in the programme and orchestra, particularly from music making; second, the security, belonging and relationships fostered through participation; the quality of musician/participant relationship is important here as is programme design which enables support, routine and structure; and third, increased pride, confidence and self-esteem, as a result of acquiring difficult musical skills, receiving regular praise and having frequent opportunities to demonstrate these acquired skills through regular orchestral performances.

There is little evidence or understanding of community-based, preventative, arts interventions like Big Noise: their delivery, their life-course impacts and their potential contribution to mental health and to addressing social and health inequalities. The causal pathways in the field are under-theorised. These early findings are important as they serve as an important basis from which to consider the programme’s wider and longer term impacts, which will be assessed through an on-going longitudinal, mixed method summative evaluation.

The purpose of this paper is to summarize existing evidence on welfare dependence among immigrants in Denmark and to produce new evidence with focus on the most recent years.

The paper combines a broad descriptive/analytical approach with multivariate estimation on the impact on welfare dependence from individual background factors.

The main finding is the importance of aggregate low unemployment for immigrants to assimilate out of welfare dependence. Fairly small effects are reported from policy changes intending to influence the economic incentives between welfare programs and jobs.

While panel data as used in the paper have a great potential, still a number of policy changes are not identified at the individual level. In further work it would be relevant to broaden the coverage including also some small policy programs and to extend the analysis to cover the period including the financial crisis years.

The paper has a potential to influence public attitudes in this area and to inform further public policy regarding benefit programs.

The main new result is the finding, at a disaggregate level, of how changes in immigration policy and cyclical changes interact, influencing the assimilation into or out of dependence on cash benefit programs.

The purpose of this paper is to analyse the implementation and effectiveness of an intensified activation scheme for very disadvantaged welfare recipients in Germany, used as a targeting device for a very generous wage subsidy (JobPerspective).

Using administrative data and a difference‐in‐difference approach, the authors analyse the implementation of the activation scheme and its impact on various labour market outcomes. To ensure that target and comparison group are comparable over time, the authors control for various individual, household and regional characteristics.

The activation of the target group of disadvantaged welfare recipients is modestly intensified directly after the scheme's introduction. This does not improve the prospects of the target group to work in regular jobs, but – as a first step – in subsidized jobs. Considering a later period, evidence was found for broader activation efforts together with some gains in the regular employment for disadvantaged welfare recipients. Overall, the results suggest that the implementation of activation for disadvantaged welfare recipients, as well as employment gains, need time.

This study analyses whether and how a scheme of intensified activation that leaves its design to local actors, without providing additional funding, makes job centres implement such a policy.

Previous literature shows that activation requirements for welfare recipients reduce welfare participation. However, the effect of mandatory activation on welfare entry and exit rates has not been fully examined. In this article, we use a rich set of register data that covers the entire population of Stockholm to study how the introduction of activation programs aimed at unemployed welfare recipients in various city districts affects the probability of individuals entering and exiting social assistance (SA). Our results show that mandatory activation has no overall average effects on SA entry or SA exit. However, we do find a significant negative effect of mandatory activation on the SA entry rate for young individuals and for unmarried individuals without children. For unmarried individuals without children, we find a positive but statistically insignificant effect on the probability to leave SA. Thus, individuals with fewer family responsibilities seem to be more responsive to the reform.

The causal relationship between the size of welfare benefits and the birth decisions of women on welfare has been explored in a number of studies using a variety of analytical approaches applied to vital statistics data, data from the Current Population Survey, the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, or similar survey data. These studies typically use non-experimental methods to relate differences in birth rates or birth decisions across states to differences in welfare benefits levels. Analyses of this type have been criticized on several grounds. Benefits across states may be correlated with unobserved interstate differences that may also be related to birth decisions. Very often, these studies measure the key independent variable, welfare benefits level, as the cash benefit guarantee under the Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) program for a household of fixed size, varying this amount by state of residence. Actual benefits paid will vary with household size, number of AFDC-eligible household members, other sources of income, and other factors.

It enables students to understand and design a business model canvas, design standard operating procedure (SOP) for very unorganized business operations and also devise base pricing for vendor negotiation.

Mr Gaurav Chaudhary, chief executive officer and Founder of Pashushala.com, established a first-ever Livestock online marketplace in India, leveraging the penetration of internet users in 2019. Pashsuhala.com evolved as an all-inclusive ecosystem that offered an innovative business model by bundling financial aid, logistics, veterinary and insurance solutions to its buyers and sellers. While every other aspect seemed to have had fallen in place, Gaurav was not convinced with the everyday handling of the cattle especially during transportation. Transporting cattle was the most challenging task tempered with issues such as changing weather conditions, stock density, lack of training on handling cattle while loading and unloading, long journey hours, feeding and watering procedures and many more for which Gaurav had to depend on the logistics partners. Gaurav was in a dilemma whether to have his own fleet armed with trained personnel for transporting the cattle or to streamline the existing operating procedures into SOP to be followed by logistics partners. If he continued with logistics partners he also had to work on standard costs i.e. fixed and variable costs incurred during the transportation of livestock. The case deals with business concepts such as supply chain risk management in the livestock sector, SOPs for a very unstructured and unpredictable ecosystem, pricing strategies and business model canvas.

Masters in business administration (MBA) and Executive MBA level.

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CSS 9: Operations and Logistics.