Documents de Beer, Paul 21 results

"De meritocratie gold lange tijd als belofte voor een meer open en gelijke samenleving. Een samenleving waarin mensen hun maatschappelijke positie verkrijgen op basis van hun eigen verdiensten. Maar wat als die verdiensten in hoge mate worden bepaald door je afkomst? Als een kind van hoogopgeleide ouders aanzienlijk meer kans maakt op succes in het onderwijs en op de arbeidsmarkt dan een kind van laagopgeleide ouders? En als ook nog eens blijkt dat het merendeel van de bevolking - inclusief de 'verliezers' - deze meritocratische principes onderschrijft? In Meritocratie: op weg naar een nieuwe klassensamenleving? Beschrijven gerenommeerde Nederlandse onderzoekers in hoeverre het huidige Nederland daadwerkelijk een meritocratische samenleving is. Vervolgens brengen zij de maatschappelijke gevolgen van hun bevindingen in kaart. Mondt de meritocratie niet uit in een nieuwe klassensamenleving, waarin de scheidslijnen nog scherper en hardnekkiger zijn dan in de voorbije industriële samenleving?"

"In the debate on the relation between social security and the labour market, the focus is on retrenchment of the government to improve the market mechanism. Little attention is being paid to the role of intermediate organisations, in particular trade unions and employers' organisations (the so-called social partners). Are these institutions just as much an impediment to the market mechanism as the government is often considered to be? Will the social partners, when they are involved in the legislation or administration of social security, pursue their particular (group) interests at the expense of the community? Or can they constitute an efficient mechanism to reconcile conflicting interests of different social groups, or provide the means to highlight the concerns and interests of weaker market actors?
The aim of our paper is to gain more insight into the pros and cons of the various options for distributing responsibility between the government, market actors (private companies) and intermediary organisations, especially in the field of unemployment protection (i.e. unemployment insurance, employment protection and active labour market policies). Using cross-national information from Belgium, Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom we show to what extent different institutional arrangements of unemployment protection lead to different labour market outcomes. Although the government plays a dominant role in all five countries, there is still a lot of variation in the role of social partners and market actors with respect to unemployment protection. Both first and second order effects of alternative distributions of responsibility are analysed. First order effects include insurance policies, coverage rates, and replacement rates. Second order effects include expenditures on unemployment protection, unemployment rates, flows between employment and unemployment, and the resulting gap between insiders and outsiders.
We conclude that there is no systematic relationship between the distribution of responsibility for unemployment insurance, employment protection and active labour market policies on the one hand, and the outcomes in terms of benefit entitlements for various groups and labour market flows on the other hand. The two countries in which trade unions play an important role in the administration of unemployment insurance, viz. Belgium and Denmark, do not stand out with respect to benefit generosity or labour market performance compared to the other three countries."

"The author examines the impact of the economic crisis on employment, earnings, inequality and poverty in the EU, focusing on Denmark, Germany, Slovakia, Spain and the United Kingdom during the period 2008–10. After reviewing the literature, he analyses recent trends, finding that during this stage of the crisis real wages reacted countercyclically in most countries, thus diverging from the pattern observed in previous recessions. He finds considerable cross-national variation in the severity and direction of changes in terms of inequality and poverty rates. However, he argues that inequality may widen because of the potential regressive effects of the announced austerity programmes."

"Although education is generally considered to be an important part of the welfare state, it is largely absent in the comparative welfare state literature. This article tries to fill this void by applying the central concepts of welfare state analysis of decommodification and stratification, as proposed by Esping-Andersen, to the field of higher education. The article tests whether there are systematic differences in higher education policies across 19 developed western countries that are usually categorized in a social democratic, a liberal or a conservative welfare regime. Based on a secondary analysis of the available literature and cross-country statistics, we construct indices for decommodification and for stratification in higher education. The countries studied cluster in three groups that correspond roughly with the classical categorization. The countries in these clusters do not, however, meet all expectations regarding the level of decommodification and stratification. We conclude that countries belonging to the social democratic regime follow the principles of the prototypical social-democratic welfare regime well with respect to higher education. However, the higher education systems in liberal and conservative countries only share some of the characteristics of a prototypical conservative or liberal welfare state. We conclude that including higher education in comparative welfare states analysis might result in a less clear-cut categorization of welfare regimes than when the analysis is restricted to social protection and labour market policies."

"Although the economic crisis that started in 2008 hit all EU member states hard, the impact of the crisis on employment, unemployment, earnings and inequality varied considerably. This paper analyses the variation in the consequences of the crisis among the member states of the EU. First, it discusses some theoretical views on the impact of the crisis on earnings and income distribution. Next, it gives a concise overview of empirical studies, based on data from previous business cycles."

"Increasing the level of labour participation is one of the key objectives of the European Employment Strategy and the Lisbon agenda. Increasing the employment rate is generally considered crucially important to safeguarding the sustainability of the welfare state and achieving a number of other socio-economic objectives. This article examines the extent to which higher employment does result in lower unemployment, lower poverty rates, decreased dependence on social security and reductions in public expenditures on social protection. To this end, a decomposition analysis is performed concerning the evolution of the unemployment rate, poverty rate, benefit recipiency rate and social expenditure rate in the 15 original EU member states and the United States since the 1980s. Results of this analysis show that, in many cases, the favourable effects of increases in employment are partially (and sometimes even fully) offset by simultaneous changes in other variables, including labour supply, eligibility criteria, benefit generosity and the concentration of non-working people in work-poor households. The article concludes that increasing the employment rate is not a panacea for all socio-economic ills. European social policy should therefore focus less one-sidedly on employment and should address additional objectives, including benefit generosity and poverty. In addition, the process of benchmarking in the EU should be transformed from its current top-down character to one which proceeds from the bottom up."

"Currently, European governments are being challenged to find an optimal social policy strategy that fosters 'flexicurity', whereby a flexible, well-functioning labour market is achieved, whilst protection for workers is maintained. This fascinating book presents an in-depth study of the particular combination of unemployment insurance, employment protection and active labour market policies prevalent in seven European countries. The editors explore the formal laws and regulations, as well as the administration and implementation of social policy, paying special attention to the role of the social partners. The country comparison shows that the combination of social policy instruments is important to labour market performance, but that multiple optimal mixes already seem to exist."