Early Interventions and Disability Insurance: Experience from a Field Experiment

Per Engström, Pathric Hägglund () and Per Johansson
Additional contact information
Pathric Hägglund: SOFI, Stockholm University

No 6553, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: This paper estimates the effects of early interventions in the Swedish sickness insurance system. The aim of the interventions is to screen and, further to, rehabilitate sick listed individuals. We find that the early interventions – in contrast to what is expected – increase the inflow into disability benefits by around 20 percent. In order to explain the results, we develop a simple theoretical model based on asymmetric information of the health status. The model predicts that the treatment effect is larger for individuals with low incentives to return to work. In order to test this prediction we estimate effects for sick listed employed and unemployed separately. Consistent with the model's prediction, we find that the effect is larger for the unemployed than for the employed.

Keywords: monitoring; screening; vocation rehabilitation; disability insurance; sickness insurances; unemployment insurance; randomized experiment (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C93 H51 H55 I18 J22 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 41 pages
Date: 2012-05
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-hea, nep-ias and nep-lab
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

Published - published in: Economic Journal, 2017,127 (600), 363 - 392

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Related works:
Journal Article: Early Interventions and Disability Insurance: Experience from a Field Experiment (2017)
Working Paper: Early interventions and disability insurance: experience from a field experiment (2012)
Working Paper: Early interventions and disability insurance: Experience from a field experiment (2012)
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