About the project
How has twenty-five years of globalisation challenged the European welfare states? The project investigates whether the European welfare state, as we know it, will survive the economic transformation.
Will a new common European model emerge and how will it look like? Or will the welfare state in some countries thrive whereas it will decline in others depending on the economies’ capacity to adjust to global change?
Taking a political economic approach, the project will also study the extent to which the political process is able to bear the demands for institutional change. Are the voters willing to authorise dramatic change?
Objective
Focusing on the global changes since 1989, the objective is to produce first class research on how trade, technology and the welfare state interact; on the challenges to national welfare states in an integrated European labour market, and on the political support for reform.
Topics:
1. The interplay between trade, technology, and the welfare state
How have trade shocks affected Austria, Germany, Norway, and the UK over the last twenty years? How have the countries’ economies and the welfare institutions responded? In particular, how have the firms adjusted to the trade shocks?
The project will make a detailed, comparative study about how the individual firms and workers adjust to the shocks in Austria, Germany, and Norway. What is the impact of trade shocks on the workers’ career and their benefit dependence?
2. National welfare states in an integrated labour market
Is welfare migration a real issue? To what extent do differences in welfare generosity shape the magnitude and type of migration flows?
This project asks whether welfare state institutions and welfare benefits influence the flows of migrants across EU countries. The project will map the employment and welfare career of migrants in the four focus countries. It will also look at how global trade shocks in conjunction with labour market integration affects the career of young workers.
3. Political support for European welfare states
To what extent does globalisation affect attitudes towards the welfare state differentially across groups? The project will study groups that are more or less likely to be exposed to increasing risks or competition from immigrants.
To what degree is wage setting institutions decisive for how globalisation changes the wage distribution? Is increased wage inequality mitigated by coordinated wage setting?
The project will also explore the political sustainability of different types of welfare spending. Is it best to rely on targeted policies that maximize the impact of tax revenues on the welfare of the poor? Or is it better to build policies on a universalistic principle, from a political point of view?
Previous events
2017: Workshop on Inequality and Welfare States
Time and place: June 19, 2017 12:00 PM – June 20, 2017 2:30 PM, Auditorium 2, Georg Sverdrups Building (University Library)
GIWeS is organizing a NORFACE WSF (Welfare State Futures) thematic workshop on inequality and welfare states.
The Workshop will consist of an opening panel comprising overviews of WSF projects, which will be followed by paper sessions.
Key topics
- implications of behavioral economics for the economics of welfare
- fiscal compliance and personal responsibility
- globalization, work and welfare
- natural and lab experiments
- behavior, institutions and inequalities
Workshop programme
Monday 19th
- 12.00 - 13.00: Lunch, “Café Sverdrup”
- 13.00 - 15.00
- Chair: Halvor Mehlum
- Alexander Cappelen, Bertil Tungodden, and Ingar Kyrkjebø Haaland (FPRWS) : Beliefs about Behavioral Responsesto Taxation
- Kalle Moene (GIWES): Universal Basic Share
- Kaisa Kotakorpi, Tomer Blumkin, and Tuomas Kosonen (4Is): Complexity and Benefit Take-up: Empirical Evidence from the Finnish Homecare Allowance
- 15.30 - 16.50
- Chair: Björn Rönnerstrand (HEALTHDOX)
- Eva Mörk, Matz Dahlberg, Ulrika Vikman, and Ingeborg Wærnbaum (4Is): Selection of a Sufficient Subset of Confounders: Using Register and Survey Data for Labour Market Program Evaluation
- Erik Ø. Sørensen, Alexander Cappelen, Mathias Ekström, and Bertil Tungodden (FPRWS): Fairness in a Winner-Takes-All Economy
- 17.00- 18.20
- Chair: Anders Kjeldsrud
- Erling Barth, Kalle Moene, and Henning Finseraas (GIWES): The Support of the Welfare State Measured by Vote Shares of Political Parties
- Diana Burlacu, Ellen M. Immergut, Maria Oskarsson, and Björn Rönnerstrand (HEALTHDOX): The Politics of Credit Claiming: Recognition and Values in Policy Feedback
- 20.00: Dinner, “Festningen” restaurant.
Tuesday 20th
- 09.00-11.00
- Chair: Hassan Molana
- Silvia Avram and Mike Brewer (4Is): The Role of Taxes & Benefits in Smoothening Income Shocks
- Thomas de Haan, Alexander Cappelen, Bertil Tungodden, and Caroline Bonn (FPRWS): Fairness Preferencesin the Face of Limited Information
- Jo Thori Lind, Rolf Aaberge, and Kalle Moene (GIWES): The Inequality of Equal Mating
- 11.30-13.30
- Chair: Henning Finseraas
- Stefan Hochguertel (4Is): Household Wealth Mobility Before and During the Great Recession: Evidence from Tax Records
- Diana Burlacu (HEALTHDOX): The Impact of Private Health Insurance on Political Preferences
- Catia Montagna, Hassan Molana, and George Onwardi (GlobLabWS): Reforming the Liberal Welfare State: International Shocks, Unemployment and Household Income Shares
- 13.30: Lunch, “Fredrikke” cantina
2016: Workshop on Globalization, Institutions and the Welfare State
Time and place: Sep. 19, 2016 9:00 AM – 4:00 PM, Room G26, UCL Department
Economics, Drayton House, 30 Gordon Street, London
The project partners came together for a workshop on Globalization, Institutions and the Welfare State at the UCL Department of Economics, London.
Programme
- 9:00 Welcome by Christian Dustmann, UCL
- 9:05 Short update on where we are in the project by project leader Kalle Moene, ESOP
- 9:15 – 10:00 Christian Dustmann, UCL: “The Winners and Losers of Technological Change", joint paper with Michele Battisti and Uta Schönberg
- 10:00- 10:45 Bernt Bratsberg, Frisch Centre: “Labor migration and excess churning”, joint paper with Oddbjørn Raaum and Knut Røed
- 10:45-11:15 Coffee and break
- 11:15-12:00 Rudolf Winter Ebmer, University of Linz: “The effects of international migration on unionisation in Austria”, joint paper with Jose-Ignacio Antón and René Böheim
- 12:00- 1 pm Follow-up on the proposal: Coordination, data sharing, and publication plans
- 1 pm - 2 pm Lunch
- 2 pm - 2:45pm Giovanni Facchini, University of Nottingham: “Immigrant franchise and immigration policy: Evidence from the Progressive Era”, joint work with Costanza Biavaschi
- 2:45 pm – 3:30 pm Oddbjørn Raaum, Frisch Centre: “Job Loss and Immigrant Labor Market Performance”, joint paper with Bernt Bratsberg and Knut Røed
- 3:30 pm – 4:00 pm Progress and plans
2016: NORFACE Workshop
Time and place: Aug. 10, 2016 11:30 AM – 5:15 PM, Norwegian School of Economics, Bergen
The main focus of the workshop is on how behavioral models, in particular reference dependent preferences, can shed light on economic behavior and the role of public policy.
Workshop programme
- 11.30-12.15: Karl Ove Moene, University of Oslo: "The preference for beliefs consonance"
- 12.30-13.15: Tristan Gagnon-Bartsch, Harvard University: "Learning with Misattribution of Reference Dependence"
- 13.15-14.00: Ben Bushong, Harvard University: "Misattribution of Reference-Dependence: Evidence from a Real-Effort Experiment"
- 14.15-15.30: Ori Heffetz, Cornell University and The Hebrew University of Jerusalem: "Expectations and the Endowment Effect"
- 15.45-16.30: Eirik Kristiansen, Norwegian School of Economics: "Paying Specialist: A Theory of Competitive Compensation"
- 16.30-17.15: Alexander Cappelen, Norwegian School of Economics: "Reference dependence and social preferences"
The workshop is a join event of the NORFACE projects “Fairness, personal responsibility and the welfare state”, headed by Alexander Cappelen and Bertil Tungodden, and “Globalization, Institutions and the Welfare State (GIWeS)” headed by Karl Ove Moene.
2015: Mini workshop at ECARES, Université Libre de Bruxelles
Time and place: Sep. 2, 2015 9:00 AM – 1:00 PM, ECARES, Brussels
The project partners came together for a mini workshop at the European Center for Advanced Research in Economics and Statistics (ECARES) in Brussels on 2 September 2015.
1. The Interplay between Trade, Technology and the Welfare State
Christian Dustmann, Giovanni Facchini, and Oddbjørn Raaum
2. National Welfare States in an Integrated European Labor Market
Bernt Bratsberg, Oddbjørn Raaum, and Rudolf Winter-Ebmer
3. Political Support for European Welfare States Insurance or Redistribution Motives?
- Behaviors and Beliefs in the Welfare State
Erling Barth, Henning Finseraas, Kalle Moene, and Kjersti M. Østbakken - The Political Support for Welfare Spending
Giovanni Facchini