Kosovo Social Protection and Health Expenditure Note

Kosovo is one of the poorest countries in Europe, and a growing proportion of the population is at risk for social exclusion and long-term poverty. Overall spending on social protection has increased significantly over recent years, largely because...

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Main Author: World Bank Group
Format: Report
Language:English
Published: World Bank, Washington, DC 2019
Subjects:
Online Access:http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/190411561720305500/Kosovo-Social-Protection-and-Health-Expenditure-Note
http://hdl.handle.net/10986/32094
id okr-10986-32094
recordtype oai_dc
spelling okr-10986-320942021-05-25T09:26:05Z Kosovo Social Protection and Health Expenditure Note World Bank Group SOCIAL PROTECTION SOCIAL ASSISTANCE PENSIONS LABOR POLICY EMPLOYMENT PROGRAM HEALTH INSURANCE HEALTH SPENDING Kosovo is one of the poorest countries in Europe, and a growing proportion of the population is at risk for social exclusion and long-term poverty. Overall spending on social protection has increased significantly over recent years, largely because of increases in pensions and war related benefits resulting in increased fiscal pressure. Pensions are a mechanism to substitute income due to a permanent loss of income generating capacity, such as old age or disability and should not be used as a compensatory measure for other reasons. For this reason, in the early 2000s and faced with the impossibility of using contributory pension records to pay pensions, a universal basic pension was introduced in Kosovo.To contain the expansion of pension spending going forward, the government must refrain from introducing new benefits, disallow increasing benefit levels for all but the basic pensions, and pro-rate existing benefits above basic pension levels contingent on funding availability. The expansion of programs targeted at specific population groups have crowded out spending of the social assistance targeted to the poor, which is both low and declining. Increasing programs' coverage and benefit levels and prioritizing the most disadvantaged are key for increasing the effectiveness and equity of social assistance. Public investments in employment promotion and active labor market programs are limited and insufficient to meet Kosovo's labor market challenges. Given that low levels of health spending, including on drugs, is a leading cause of poverty, the social health insurance reform should not only work to improve health outcomes but also to improve financial risk protection, especially for the poor. 2019-07-16T15:58:09Z 2019-07-16T15:58:09Z 2018-05 Report http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/190411561720305500/Kosovo-Social-Protection-and-Health-Expenditure-Note http://hdl.handle.net/10986/32094 English CC BY 3.0 IGO http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/igo World Bank World Bank, Washington, DC Economic & Sector Work :: Other Social Protection Study Economic & Sector Work Europe and Central Asia Kosovo
repository_type Digital Repository
institution_category Foreign Institution
institution Digital Repositories
building World Bank Open Knowledge Repository
collection World Bank
language English
topic SOCIAL PROTECTION
SOCIAL ASSISTANCE
PENSIONS
LABOR POLICY
EMPLOYMENT PROGRAM
HEALTH INSURANCE
HEALTH SPENDING
spellingShingle SOCIAL PROTECTION
SOCIAL ASSISTANCE
PENSIONS
LABOR POLICY
EMPLOYMENT PROGRAM
HEALTH INSURANCE
HEALTH SPENDING
World Bank Group
Kosovo Social Protection and Health Expenditure Note
geographic_facet Europe and Central Asia
Kosovo
description Kosovo is one of the poorest countries in Europe, and a growing proportion of the population is at risk for social exclusion and long-term poverty. Overall spending on social protection has increased significantly over recent years, largely because of increases in pensions and war related benefits resulting in increased fiscal pressure. Pensions are a mechanism to substitute income due to a permanent loss of income generating capacity, such as old age or disability and should not be used as a compensatory measure for other reasons. For this reason, in the early 2000s and faced with the impossibility of using contributory pension records to pay pensions, a universal basic pension was introduced in Kosovo.To contain the expansion of pension spending going forward, the government must refrain from introducing new benefits, disallow increasing benefit levels for all but the basic pensions, and pro-rate existing benefits above basic pension levels contingent on funding availability. The expansion of programs targeted at specific population groups have crowded out spending of the social assistance targeted to the poor, which is both low and declining. Increasing programs' coverage and benefit levels and prioritizing the most disadvantaged are key for increasing the effectiveness and equity of social assistance. Public investments in employment promotion and active labor market programs are limited and insufficient to meet Kosovo's labor market challenges. Given that low levels of health spending, including on drugs, is a leading cause of poverty, the social health insurance reform should not only work to improve health outcomes but also to improve financial risk protection, especially for the poor.
format Report
author World Bank Group
author_facet World Bank Group
author_sort World Bank Group
title Kosovo Social Protection and Health Expenditure Note
title_short Kosovo Social Protection and Health Expenditure Note
title_full Kosovo Social Protection and Health Expenditure Note
title_fullStr Kosovo Social Protection and Health Expenditure Note
title_full_unstemmed Kosovo Social Protection and Health Expenditure Note
title_sort kosovo social protection and health expenditure note
publisher World Bank, Washington, DC
publishDate 2019
url http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/190411561720305500/Kosovo-Social-Protection-and-Health-Expenditure-Note
http://hdl.handle.net/10986/32094
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