Take-up of Social Benefits: Experimental Evidence from France

Laura Castell, Marc Gurgand, Imbert, Clément and Todor Tochev

No 20615, CEPR Discussion Papers from Centre for Economic Policy Research

Abstract: We report on two nationwide experiments with job seekers in France. We first show that a meeting with social services to assess eligibility and help with application to social benefits increased new benefit take-up by 29%. By contrast, an online simulator that gave personalized information on benefit eligibility did not increase take-up. Marginal treatment effects show that individuals who benefit the most from the meetings are the least likely to attend. Overall, without ruling out information frictions, our results suggest that transaction costs represent the main obstacle to applying for benefits or accessing government’s assistance to help apply.

Keywords: Take-up of government programs; Targeting; Welfare; Marginal treatment effects (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: H53 I38 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025-09
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