Category: Welfare
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Portuguese Labour Market Reforms in the Aftermath of the Eurozone Crisis: The Problems Behind the Recovery
This is a extended repost of a blog written with Jasper Simons for Critcom, the blog of the Council of European Studies. If one were to believe the assessments of European institutions, Portugal is on the path to recover from the severe economic crisis it suffered from 2010 onwards, and the drastic reforms implemented in…
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A modest proposal to curtail the political influence of the elderly
Modern political economies are strongly skewed towards the interests of older people. In the United states, per capita spending on the old via pensions or medicare stood at $26’000, while spending on the young via child benefits or other programs was at less than $12’000 (data for the graph below from here). Pensions in particular…
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The Economic Dilemma of UKIP
Let us take a short trip Back to the Future. Step into The Doc’s DeLorean modified time Machine, fasten your seat belt, greet Marty McFly in the back seat, and set the destination to 2016 Britain. We accelerate to 88 miles per hour, and after a loud “bang”, it only takes a few seconds to…
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What if More Austerity Meant More Immigration?
Since January 1st, citizens from Romania and Bulgaria can freely access the labour markets of all EU member states, including the United Kingdom. Fed by the threat of UKIP and a tabloid press that doesn’t really bother with facts, both Tories and Labour are up in arms in the face of a potential “invasion” of…
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Reforming Southern Europe: How to Square the Triangle of Employment, Fiscal Austerity and Inequality?
Mass unemployment is probably one of the most worrying features of the Eurozone crisis. As youth unemployment is hitting record levels (one in four people under 25 in Europe and more than one in two in Spain are officially out of work), many observers are warning against the rise of a “lost generation”, especially in…
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La Suisse est le pays d’Europe qui redistribue le moins
AvenirSuisse a publié aujourd’hui une étude sur les inégalités en Suisse, pour contrer l’initiative 1:12. Ils affirment que les inégalités salariales en Suisse sont les plus basses de l’OCDE. D’après les données du Luxemburg Income Study 2005 (le graphe est basé sur les données de Lane Kenworthy, University of Arizona), c’est le cas seulement avant…