Does eliminating benefit eligibility requirements improve unemployed job search and labour market outcomes?

Journal Publication ResearchOnline@JCU
Gerards, Ruud;Welters, Riccardo
Abstract

Benefit eligibility requirements intend to incentivize the unemployed to find work more quickly. Our results, in an Australian context, suggest that those subjected to benefit eligibility requirements, despite searching at least as hard, take longer to find employment. Moreover, they spend less time in employment in the first twelve months and, if employed, have jobs with lower wages and fewer hours compared to otherwise similar unemployed without benefit eligibility requirements. Our findings are consistent with cognitive theories that emphasize that benefit eligibility requirements externalize job search motivation and increase stress, both of which reduce employment search effectiveness.

Journal

Applied Economics Letters

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Volume

29

ISBN/ISSN

1466-4291

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Issue

10

Pages Count

4

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Publisher

Routledge

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Publisher Location

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Publish Date

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Date

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EISSN

N/A

DOI

10.1080/13504851.2021.1927960