How Effective Are Hiring Subsidies to Reduce Long-Term Unemployment among Prime-Aged Jobseekers? Evidence from Belgium

Sam Desiere and Bart Cockx

No 14767, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: Hiring subsidies are widely used to create (stable) employment for the long-term unemployed. This paper exploits the abolition of a hiring subsidy targeted at long-term unemployed jobseekers over 45 years of age in Belgium to evaluate its effectiveness in the short and medium run. Based on a triple difference methodology the hiring subsidy is shown to increase the job finding rate by 13% without any evidence of spill-over effects. This effect is driven by a positive effect on individuals with at least a bachelor's degree. However, the hiring subsidy mainly created temporary short-lived employment: eligible jobseekers were not more likely to find employment that lasted at least twelve consecutive months than ineligible jobseekers.

Keywords: temporary help agencies; hiring subsidies; long-term unemployment; prime-aged jobseekers; triple difference (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: H22 J08 J18 J23 J38 J64 J65 J68 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 38 pages
Date: 2021-10
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-eur and nep-lab
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Published - published in: IZA Journal of Labor Policy , 2022, 12(1)

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Related works:
Working Paper: How Effective Are Hiring Subsidies to Reduce Long-Term Unemployment among Prime-Aged Jobseekers? Evidence from Belgium (2021)
Working Paper: How effective are hiring subsidies to reduce long-term unemployment among prime-aged jobseekers? Evidence from Belgium (2021)
Working Paper: How effective are hiring subsidies to reduce long-term unemployment among prime-aged jobseekers? Evidence from Belgium (2021)
Working Paper: How effective are hiring subsidies to reduce long-term unemployment among prime-aged jobseekers? Evidence from Belgium (2021)
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