Reintegrating Older Long-Term Unemployed Workers: The Impact of Temporary Job Guarantees

Alexander Ahammer, Martin Halla, Pia Heckl and Rudolf Winter-Ebmer
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Alexander Ahammer: Department of Economics, Johannes Kepler University Linz, Austria; and Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA)
Martin Halla: Department of Economics, Vienna University of Economics and Business, Austria; Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA); Austrian National Public Health Institute (GOEG); Rockwool Foundation Berlin; and Austrian Institute of Economic Research (WIFO)
Pia Heckl: ifo Institute; Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich; and CESifo
Rudolf Winter-Ebmer: Department of Economics, Johannes Kepler University Linz, Austria; Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA); Institute for Advanced Studies (IHS); Rockwool Foundation Berlin, Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR)

No 1, IHS Discussion Papers from Institute for Advanced Studies

Keywords: Long-term unemployment among older workers is particularly difficult to overcome. We study the impacts of a large-scale job guarantee program that offered up to two years of fully subsidized employment to long-term unemployed individuals aged 50 and above. Using a sharp age-based discontinuity in eligibility; we find that participation increased regular; unsubsidized employment by 43 percentage points two years after the program ended. The gains are driven by transitions into new firms and industries; rather than continued subsidized employment; and we find no evidence of displacement effects for non-participants or spillovers to family members. The program had no measurable short-run health effects. (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: H51 I14 J08 J64 J78 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: pages 44
Date: 2026-03
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https://irihs.ihs.ac.at/id/eprint/7406/ First version, 2026 (application/pdf)

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