Protect Incomes or Protect Jobs? The Role of Social Policies in Post-Pandemic Recovery
This paper examines the effectiveness of income protection and job protection policies for the post-pandemic economic recovery of the second half of 2020 through 2021. The paper is based on a new data set of the budgets of social protection program...
| Main Authors: | , , |
|---|---|
| Format: | Working Paper |
| Language: | English English |
| Published: |
World Bank, Washington, DC
2022
|
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/099521409072229295/IDU0237221f202381046df0aa8104aa167b992f0 http://hdl.handle.net/10986/37973 |
| Summary: | This paper examines the effectiveness
of income protection and job protection policies for the
post-pandemic economic recovery of the second half of 2020
through 2021. The paper is based on a new data set of the
budgets of social protection programs implemented as a part
of the pandemic stimulus package in 154 countries. The
empirical analysis shows that, in the short run, higher
expenditure on job protection measures is associated with
more robust gross domestic product growth, increased
employment, and decreased inactivity and poverty rates
compared to the expansion of income protection programs.
Both policies had a significant economic impact only in
countries with weaker pre-pandemic social insurance systems.
In countries with broader coverage of the social insurance
system, the income and job protection programs appear to
have had a limited impact on post-pandemic recovery. Because
the structural economic changes induced by the pandemic are
expected to materialize fully in several years, more
research is needed to understand the longer-term effects of
job protection and income protection policies on labor
markets and economic recovery. |
|---|