Incentives and Disincentives: Analysing Welfare Mechanisms’ Effects on Job Search Behaviourjob search activity

Simon Watkins ()

Chapter Chapter 8 in Basic Income, Work Incentives and Job Search Behaviour, 2025, pp 147-167 from Palgrave Macmillan

Abstract: Abstract This chapter bridges theory and empirical evidence by analysing the relationship between basic income welfare mechanisms and job search activities amongst unemployed people across ten European countries. Using fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis (QCA), the analysis examines behaviours under a variety of welfare conditions. The analysis focuses on three key conditions: conditionality, accessibility, and participation tax rates. The findings reveal that work incentives have limited impact on job search intensity, whilst a specific combination of welfare conditions prove sufficient for low job search activity. The results highlight the importance of institutional context, administrative approaches, and complex causality in understanding how welfare systems influence labour market behaviours. The chapter offers important insights for basic income policy design by demonstrating that the behavioural effects of welfare mechanisms are neither linear nor deterministic but emerge from complex interactions within specific welfare ecosystems.

Keywords: Necessary and sufficient conditions; Work first approach; Human capital approach; Administration of conditionality; Benefit duration and generosity; Causal asymmetry; Conjunctural causation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pal:etbchp:978-3-031-99197-4_8

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DOI: 10.1007/978-3-031-99197-4_8

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