Ethnic and racial discrimination violates the basic human right to equal opportunity, adopted by ... more Ethnic and racial discrimination violates the basic human right to equal opportunity, adopted by the United Nations in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948. Discrimination is a threat to the cohesion of society and leads to the exclusion of some people. To combat discrimination, we must understand its extent, how it manifests, and how it can best
The population of Sweden is ageing and the number of pensioners is increasing. This means that th... more The population of Sweden is ageing and the number of pensioners is increasing. This means that the incomes of older people and the income differences between older and younger people and among pensioners have become more important in terms of public debate and research. In this paper, we examine the income distribution of those 65 years and older. The income differences among both men and women have increased among those of 65-74 years and older since 1982. Women generally have lower incomes and pensions than men. Foreign born persons generally have lower incomes and pensions compared to natives. This difference has increased, especially with regard to those coming from non-OECD countries. Among those with low pensions, women, the foreign born and those who have been selfemployed are overrepresented. Many who retire have large amount of net wealth, especially in the form of property (houses, apartments).
Ungdomsarbetslösheten är ett allvarligt problem. Dels leder den till problem för ungdomarna under... more Ungdomsarbetslösheten är ett allvarligt problem. Dels leder den till problem för ungdomarna under den tid de är arbetslösa, dels -och kanske än viktigare -leder perioder av arbetslöshet under ungdomstiden till en sämre situation på arbetsmarknaden senare i livet. Man talar om "ärr-bildning" (scarring). 1 Det är inte minst därför angeläget med forskning om ungdomsarbetslöshetens orsaker och om vilka åtgärder som kan minska den eller dess negativa konsekvenser. Det behövs forskning om ungdomsarbetslösheten inom olika vetenskapliga discipliner. Peter Håkanssons doktorsavhandling är ett bidrag till denna forskning. Avhandlingens första kapitel ger en allmän bakgrund. Det innehåller en översikt av ungdomsarbetslösheten i Sverige jämfört med den i andra länder. Jämförelsen pekar på att ungdomsarbetslösheten är relativt hög i Sverige. I kapitlet berörs också frågor som kommer igen i senare avsnitt, som betydelsen av selektion, nätverkens roll, olika teorier för att förklara ungdomsarbetslösheten och hur ungdomarnas övergång till arbetsmarknaden är organiserad i övergångsregimer och hur dessa har förändrats över tiden. Kapitel 2 behandlar frågan om hur det går att förklara att ungdomsar-* Fakultetsopponent 1. För en ny undersökning av de långsiktiga individuella konsekvenserna av ungdomsarbetslöshet i Norge se Øivind Nilsen och Katrine Holm Reiso, "Scarring effects of unemployment", Norwegian School of Economics, Discussion paper, December 2011, <DWSDownload. aspx?File=%2fFiles%2fFiler%2finstitutter%2fsam%2fDiscussion+papers%2f2011%2f26.pdf> (17/1 2012). Den innehåller referenser till tidigare undersökningar av samma fråga i Norge och i andra länder.
economists, whose research aims to provide answers to the global labor market challenges of our t... more economists, whose research aims to provide answers to the global labor market challenges of our time. Our key objective is to build bridges between academic research, policymakers and society. IZA Discussion Papers often represent preliminary work and are circulated to encourage discussion. Citation of such a paper should account for its provisional character. A revised version may be available directly from the author.
Although employment participation of older workers and their timing of (early) retirement is ofte... more Although employment participation of older workers and their timing of (early) retirement is often modelled as an individual-level decision, the opportunities for late career employment, and restrictions that older workers potentially face, are largely shaped by labour market contextual factors. These may include labour market regulations and policies, attitudes of employers, as well as other dynamics between employers and employees and/or their associations. Much of the research in this field focuses on the supply side of the labour market. That is, when and why older workers want to continue working, and what the effects of policy changes are on the supply side. Although growing in importance, there is less understanding of how employers' attitudes and behaviour affect employment participation rates of older workers. ↘ Older workers are less likely to lose their job than younger workers, but when they do, they are much less likely to find reemployment. When they do find reemployment, they are often faced with wage cuts. Some older workers move from unemployment into self-employment. ↘ Employers in countries with strong deferred compensation schemes, e.g. steep wage-tenure profiles or increasing wages with seniority, are less likely to hire older workers than employers in countries with more equal compensation schemes. ↘ Many companies employ, but do not hire older workers. That is, they hire them when they are young and employ them into old age, but they are much less likely to hire older workers out of the labour market. ↘ The opportunities for older workers to work past normal retirement age are very limited. Many countries do not have explicit policies for this, and employers appear very reluctant to offer these opportunities to older workers that wish to continue working. ↘ Self-employment is quite common among older workers. However, there are different reasons why people move into self-employment. Some choose this form of employment because they would like to remain active, possibly working part-time, after their career job. Meanwhile others move into self-employment because they cannot find employment with a decent income. ↘ Planned migration of older workers, e.g. to Southern Europe, or migration of immigrants back to their countries of origin can affect the timing of retirement and the transition into self-employment or bridge jobs. ↘ Early retirement provisions significantly shortened the employment participation of older workers in the past. Not only those wishing to retire early could afford to do so, also many of those with the intention to remain in the labour force could be pressured to leave by their employers. ↘ Most countries have, by now, implemented policies that largely discourage or prevent early retirement. In addition, most "alternative pathways" to early retirement, often covered by disability insurance funds or unemployment benefits, have been largely closed. This has effectively risen the retirement age in most countries. ↘ Given that the labour market is so complex, many of the studies have a rather limited focus, and often do The full version of this report is available on the project's website at: → www.jp-demographic.eu/about/fast-track-projects/ understanding-employment This report is published as part of: → Hasselhorn HM, Apt W (2015) Understanding employment participation of older workers: Creating a knowledge base for future labour market challenges. Research Report.
We study immigrants in temporary employment agencies in Sweden using a unique data set that cover... more We study immigrants in temporary employment agencies in Sweden using a unique data set that covers all aged 16-64 who were employed by temporary employment agencies (TEAs) in Sweden in November 1999, with information on their employment status in 1998 and 2000. We find that young people, women, people living in big cities, and immigrants are overrepresented in the TEAs. Grouping immigrants after origin shows that immigrants from Africa, Asia and South America are greatly overrepresented in the sector. Immigrants are on average slightly older than the natives who work in TEAs, they are more often married, and women are less overrepresented among those born outside of Sweden. The immigrants are overrepresented among those with the lowest education and those with higher education. The mobility between employment status (employed in a TEA, other type of employment, unemployed, studying) differs between immigrants and natives in several respects. One result is that immigrants more often leave a TEA for another type of employment, which could be interpreted as employment in a TEA being used as a stepping stone to the labour market.
Other Forms of Employment: Temporary Employment Agencies and Self-Employment * In most industrial... more Other Forms of Employment: Temporary Employment Agencies and Self-Employment * In most industrialized countries the majority of employed people are full-time employees with a non-temporary job and work at a workplace of the company in which they are employed. They are making careers at the employer they are employed by and most work-place changes are to other jobs of the same type. But it does not include large groups in the labour market. Many of those who have tenured positions work part-time, not full-time, and many both full-time and part-time workers have fixed-period contracts, contracts which only guarantee employment for a specified period of time. Some demographic groups are overrepresented among those with those types of jobs, young people, women, immigrants, ethnic minorities, and older workers, who to a large extent for different reasons do not have a very strong position in the labour market. In this paper two groups outside the core of full-time employees are analyzed: those employed in temporary employment agencies, and the selfemployed. The size and composition of both groups have changed during the last decade. The number employed by temporary employment agencies has increased in Western Europe as a consequence of deregulation of this sector in the 1990s, and the composition of the selfemployed has changed from mainly being farmers to being business-owners in various sectors. We will use Sweden as an example, but the Swedish experience is not unique. Other countries have similar and in many cases more of those types of employment.
The facts presented in this study and the observations and viewpoints expressed are the sole resp... more The facts presented in this study and the observations and viewpoints expressed are the sole responsibility of the authors. They do not necessarily represent positions of the W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research.
Employees Who Become Self-Employed: Do Labour Income and Wages Have an Impact? * This paper analy... more Employees Who Become Self-Employed: Do Labour Income and Wages Have an Impact? * This paper analyzes the self-employment decision among Swedish-born male employees. The main objective of the paper is to investigate the impact of the relation between the actual and the predicted income on the probability to become self-employed. The predicted income is calculated from a standard income regression with controls for age, education, family status, family background and place of residence. By construction of a ratio between the actual and the predicted income we identify three groups of employees: (1) employees who have an actual income lower than the predicted income (underpaid), (2) employees with an actual income close to the predicted one, and (3) employees with an actual income higher than the predicted one (overpaid). The first question is if individuals who are "overpaid" or "underpaid" are more likely to become self-employed than those who are paid as we can expect. Our main finding is that employees who receive an income that differs from the one predicted by the income regression are more likely to become self-employed. We also analyse the effect of the ratio on four different measures of success as self-employed: income from self-employment, number of employees, turnover of the firm, and the probability to have a firm registered as a limited liability company. The general conclusion is that those who performed well as employees are also more successful as self-employed.
The utilization and reward of the human capital of immigrants in the labor market of the host cou... more The utilization and reward of the human capital of immigrants in the labor market of the host country has been studied extensively. Using Swedish register data from 2001-2008, we extend the immigrant educational mismatch literature by analyzing incidence, wage effects and state dependence in overeducation among natives and immigrants. In line with previous research we find a higher incidence and a lower return to overeducation among immigrants indicating that immigrants lose more from being overeducated. We find a high degree of state dependence in overeducation both among natives and immigrants, but considerably higher among immigrants.
Phased retirement has been discussed as a means for increasing labour supply for people of older ... more Phased retirement has been discussed as a means for increasing labour supply for people of older active age. The idea is that instead of leaving a full-time job early for full-time retirement, an employee should reduce the working time either in the same job or by changing jobs, and stay on in the labour market. In this paper we analyze the factors that influence the decision to take up a part-time pension and continue working at the same work place at reduced hours. We do this by using a unique data set from one employer in the governmental sector in Sweden, Stockholm University. The pension scheme is a special parttime pension scheme introduced for state employees in 2003. Employees 61 years and older can apply for a part-time pension up to the age of 65. The employers decide if they will accept or reject the application. They may also encourage employees to apply or discourage them from doing so. We have a data set covering all employees of the age groups who are eligible and a rich data set with information on the employees and also on the units (departments) who in practice decide if an application should be accepted or not. We find that both the effects on pension wealth of taking a part-time pension, and the economic situation of the department are important for the propensity for becoming a part-time pensioner. Also individual characteristics such as gender, age, earnings and occupation are important.
This paper is an analysis of the various part-time pension schemes in Sweden and relates the syst... more This paper is an analysis of the various part-time pension schemes in Sweden and relates the systems and the changes in them to the development of part-time work. Sweden had a special partial pension scheme between 1976 and 2001. One intention behind the introduction of the system was to increase labour supply. It was one of three part-time pension schemes in the social security system. The three schemes have been: 1) A partial early old-age pension (leading to a lower pension even after 65), 2) A partial disability pension, and 3) The special part-time pension scheme (which does not lead to a lower pension after 65). The possibility of combining pension and work may be seen as a part of the Swedish welfare state and a part of a strong commitment to the work principle. The special partial pension scheme became very popular with a high take-up rate and was criticized for being too expensive. As a part of the decision on the old age pension scheme in 1994, the partial pension scheme was made less generous. It was also decided that the scheme would be totally abolished from year 2001. The other two options for combining work and receiving a pension will continue. The far less generous rules from 1995 led to a reduction in the take-up rates of partial pensions. The number of people who take a partial early old age pension has increased but not to a large extent. The takeup rate of part-time disability pensions has increased among those aged 60 to 64, but not so much that it compensates for the abolishment of the special part-time effect. In this paper an evaluation is made of the full-scale experiment with a subsidized parttime pension system. The results indicate that the effect that people continue to work part-time instead of taking an early exit route is larger than the effect that people who would have continued to work full-time until ordinary retirement age instead work parttime. According to the estimates the total labour supply measured in hours increased. The special partial pension scheme was not only popular among employees but also among employers as a way for them to facilitate work-force restructuring. This may partially explain why the authority of state employers reached an agreement with the trade unions on a new employer-financed partial pension scheme. This scheme has been in force since January 1, 2003. Unions in other sectors of the economy have argued for similar agreements but have not yet reached any results.
Journal of International Migration and Integration, Jul 7, 2011
Self-employment is very common among some immigrant groups in Sweden and many of them hire co-nat... more Self-employment is very common among some immigrant groups in Sweden and many of them hire co-nationals in their firms. One reason might be that they want to give newly arrived co-nationals the possibility to earn an income. But what are the consequences for the employees of being employed by a co-national? This paper analyzes the impact on labour income and future employment prospects of being employed by self-employed co-nationals shortly after arrival to Sweden. We find that immigrants in this group have substantially lower incomes than newly arrived immigrants with other forms of employment. We also find that they are less likely to work as employees in the private sector (other than being employed by a self-employed) in the future and are much more likely to become self-employed.
Sweden Have Such Low Incomes? * When studying income differences and income distribution, the sel... more Sweden Have Such Low Incomes? * When studying income differences and income distribution, the self-employed are often excluded from the population studied. There are several good reasons for this, for example that incomes from self-employment are not reported to the same extent as incomes from being an employee. On the other hand it is a problem to exclude the self-employed when studying income differences if the group is large, if the share that is self-employed differs between groups and if there is a difference in the average income from self-employment compared to the average wage income. This is the case when we study incomes for immigrants in Western Europe. The immigrants are overrepresented among the selfemployed, self-employed immigrants are in other sectors than self-employed natives, and the incomes from self-employment differ from the incomes of the wage earners. In this paper we look at the incomes for the self-employed in Denmark and Sweden. To minimize the problems with unreported income we will mainly compare the annual incomes of the selfemployed immigrants and their native counterparts. The measurement error should only create a bias in the estimate of the income difference between the groups if there is a systematic difference in how they report their incomes. Using two cross-sections, one for each country, we find large income differences between natives and immigrants in both countries. Regression estimates show that most characteristics have the same influence in the two countries but also some interesting differences. Using quantile regressions we find that the difference in annual incomes differs depending on where in the income distribution we look. We find that the difference is smaller higher up in the distribution.
Ethnic and racial discrimination violates the basic human right to equal opportunity, adopted by ... more Ethnic and racial discrimination violates the basic human right to equal opportunity, adopted by the United Nations in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948. Discrimination is a threat to the cohesion of society and leads to the exclusion of some people. To combat discrimination, we must understand its extent, how it manifests, and how it can best
The population of Sweden is ageing and the number of pensioners is increasing. This means that th... more The population of Sweden is ageing and the number of pensioners is increasing. This means that the incomes of older people and the income differences between older and younger people and among pensioners have become more important in terms of public debate and research. In this paper, we examine the income distribution of those 65 years and older. The income differences among both men and women have increased among those of 65-74 years and older since 1982. Women generally have lower incomes and pensions than men. Foreign born persons generally have lower incomes and pensions compared to natives. This difference has increased, especially with regard to those coming from non-OECD countries. Among those with low pensions, women, the foreign born and those who have been selfemployed are overrepresented. Many who retire have large amount of net wealth, especially in the form of property (houses, apartments).
Ungdomsarbetslösheten är ett allvarligt problem. Dels leder den till problem för ungdomarna under... more Ungdomsarbetslösheten är ett allvarligt problem. Dels leder den till problem för ungdomarna under den tid de är arbetslösa, dels -och kanske än viktigare -leder perioder av arbetslöshet under ungdomstiden till en sämre situation på arbetsmarknaden senare i livet. Man talar om "ärr-bildning" (scarring). 1 Det är inte minst därför angeläget med forskning om ungdomsarbetslöshetens orsaker och om vilka åtgärder som kan minska den eller dess negativa konsekvenser. Det behövs forskning om ungdomsarbetslösheten inom olika vetenskapliga discipliner. Peter Håkanssons doktorsavhandling är ett bidrag till denna forskning. Avhandlingens första kapitel ger en allmän bakgrund. Det innehåller en översikt av ungdomsarbetslösheten i Sverige jämfört med den i andra länder. Jämförelsen pekar på att ungdomsarbetslösheten är relativt hög i Sverige. I kapitlet berörs också frågor som kommer igen i senare avsnitt, som betydelsen av selektion, nätverkens roll, olika teorier för att förklara ungdomsarbetslösheten och hur ungdomarnas övergång till arbetsmarknaden är organiserad i övergångsregimer och hur dessa har förändrats över tiden. Kapitel 2 behandlar frågan om hur det går att förklara att ungdomsar-* Fakultetsopponent 1. För en ny undersökning av de långsiktiga individuella konsekvenserna av ungdomsarbetslöshet i Norge se Øivind Nilsen och Katrine Holm Reiso, "Scarring effects of unemployment", Norwegian School of Economics, Discussion paper, December 2011, <DWSDownload. aspx?File=%2fFiles%2fFiler%2finstitutter%2fsam%2fDiscussion+papers%2f2011%2f26.pdf> (17/1 2012). Den innehåller referenser till tidigare undersökningar av samma fråga i Norge och i andra länder.
economists, whose research aims to provide answers to the global labor market challenges of our t... more economists, whose research aims to provide answers to the global labor market challenges of our time. Our key objective is to build bridges between academic research, policymakers and society. IZA Discussion Papers often represent preliminary work and are circulated to encourage discussion. Citation of such a paper should account for its provisional character. A revised version may be available directly from the author.
Although employment participation of older workers and their timing of (early) retirement is ofte... more Although employment participation of older workers and their timing of (early) retirement is often modelled as an individual-level decision, the opportunities for late career employment, and restrictions that older workers potentially face, are largely shaped by labour market contextual factors. These may include labour market regulations and policies, attitudes of employers, as well as other dynamics between employers and employees and/or their associations. Much of the research in this field focuses on the supply side of the labour market. That is, when and why older workers want to continue working, and what the effects of policy changes are on the supply side. Although growing in importance, there is less understanding of how employers' attitudes and behaviour affect employment participation rates of older workers. ↘ Older workers are less likely to lose their job than younger workers, but when they do, they are much less likely to find reemployment. When they do find reemployment, they are often faced with wage cuts. Some older workers move from unemployment into self-employment. ↘ Employers in countries with strong deferred compensation schemes, e.g. steep wage-tenure profiles or increasing wages with seniority, are less likely to hire older workers than employers in countries with more equal compensation schemes. ↘ Many companies employ, but do not hire older workers. That is, they hire them when they are young and employ them into old age, but they are much less likely to hire older workers out of the labour market. ↘ The opportunities for older workers to work past normal retirement age are very limited. Many countries do not have explicit policies for this, and employers appear very reluctant to offer these opportunities to older workers that wish to continue working. ↘ Self-employment is quite common among older workers. However, there are different reasons why people move into self-employment. Some choose this form of employment because they would like to remain active, possibly working part-time, after their career job. Meanwhile others move into self-employment because they cannot find employment with a decent income. ↘ Planned migration of older workers, e.g. to Southern Europe, or migration of immigrants back to their countries of origin can affect the timing of retirement and the transition into self-employment or bridge jobs. ↘ Early retirement provisions significantly shortened the employment participation of older workers in the past. Not only those wishing to retire early could afford to do so, also many of those with the intention to remain in the labour force could be pressured to leave by their employers. ↘ Most countries have, by now, implemented policies that largely discourage or prevent early retirement. In addition, most "alternative pathways" to early retirement, often covered by disability insurance funds or unemployment benefits, have been largely closed. This has effectively risen the retirement age in most countries. ↘ Given that the labour market is so complex, many of the studies have a rather limited focus, and often do The full version of this report is available on the project's website at: → www.jp-demographic.eu/about/fast-track-projects/ understanding-employment This report is published as part of: → Hasselhorn HM, Apt W (2015) Understanding employment participation of older workers: Creating a knowledge base for future labour market challenges. Research Report.
We study immigrants in temporary employment agencies in Sweden using a unique data set that cover... more We study immigrants in temporary employment agencies in Sweden using a unique data set that covers all aged 16-64 who were employed by temporary employment agencies (TEAs) in Sweden in November 1999, with information on their employment status in 1998 and 2000. We find that young people, women, people living in big cities, and immigrants are overrepresented in the TEAs. Grouping immigrants after origin shows that immigrants from Africa, Asia and South America are greatly overrepresented in the sector. Immigrants are on average slightly older than the natives who work in TEAs, they are more often married, and women are less overrepresented among those born outside of Sweden. The immigrants are overrepresented among those with the lowest education and those with higher education. The mobility between employment status (employed in a TEA, other type of employment, unemployed, studying) differs between immigrants and natives in several respects. One result is that immigrants more often leave a TEA for another type of employment, which could be interpreted as employment in a TEA being used as a stepping stone to the labour market.
Other Forms of Employment: Temporary Employment Agencies and Self-Employment * In most industrial... more Other Forms of Employment: Temporary Employment Agencies and Self-Employment * In most industrialized countries the majority of employed people are full-time employees with a non-temporary job and work at a workplace of the company in which they are employed. They are making careers at the employer they are employed by and most work-place changes are to other jobs of the same type. But it does not include large groups in the labour market. Many of those who have tenured positions work part-time, not full-time, and many both full-time and part-time workers have fixed-period contracts, contracts which only guarantee employment for a specified period of time. Some demographic groups are overrepresented among those with those types of jobs, young people, women, immigrants, ethnic minorities, and older workers, who to a large extent for different reasons do not have a very strong position in the labour market. In this paper two groups outside the core of full-time employees are analyzed: those employed in temporary employment agencies, and the selfemployed. The size and composition of both groups have changed during the last decade. The number employed by temporary employment agencies has increased in Western Europe as a consequence of deregulation of this sector in the 1990s, and the composition of the selfemployed has changed from mainly being farmers to being business-owners in various sectors. We will use Sweden as an example, but the Swedish experience is not unique. Other countries have similar and in many cases more of those types of employment.
The facts presented in this study and the observations and viewpoints expressed are the sole resp... more The facts presented in this study and the observations and viewpoints expressed are the sole responsibility of the authors. They do not necessarily represent positions of the W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research.
Employees Who Become Self-Employed: Do Labour Income and Wages Have an Impact? * This paper analy... more Employees Who Become Self-Employed: Do Labour Income and Wages Have an Impact? * This paper analyzes the self-employment decision among Swedish-born male employees. The main objective of the paper is to investigate the impact of the relation between the actual and the predicted income on the probability to become self-employed. The predicted income is calculated from a standard income regression with controls for age, education, family status, family background and place of residence. By construction of a ratio between the actual and the predicted income we identify three groups of employees: (1) employees who have an actual income lower than the predicted income (underpaid), (2) employees with an actual income close to the predicted one, and (3) employees with an actual income higher than the predicted one (overpaid). The first question is if individuals who are "overpaid" or "underpaid" are more likely to become self-employed than those who are paid as we can expect. Our main finding is that employees who receive an income that differs from the one predicted by the income regression are more likely to become self-employed. We also analyse the effect of the ratio on four different measures of success as self-employed: income from self-employment, number of employees, turnover of the firm, and the probability to have a firm registered as a limited liability company. The general conclusion is that those who performed well as employees are also more successful as self-employed.
The utilization and reward of the human capital of immigrants in the labor market of the host cou... more The utilization and reward of the human capital of immigrants in the labor market of the host country has been studied extensively. Using Swedish register data from 2001-2008, we extend the immigrant educational mismatch literature by analyzing incidence, wage effects and state dependence in overeducation among natives and immigrants. In line with previous research we find a higher incidence and a lower return to overeducation among immigrants indicating that immigrants lose more from being overeducated. We find a high degree of state dependence in overeducation both among natives and immigrants, but considerably higher among immigrants.
Phased retirement has been discussed as a means for increasing labour supply for people of older ... more Phased retirement has been discussed as a means for increasing labour supply for people of older active age. The idea is that instead of leaving a full-time job early for full-time retirement, an employee should reduce the working time either in the same job or by changing jobs, and stay on in the labour market. In this paper we analyze the factors that influence the decision to take up a part-time pension and continue working at the same work place at reduced hours. We do this by using a unique data set from one employer in the governmental sector in Sweden, Stockholm University. The pension scheme is a special parttime pension scheme introduced for state employees in 2003. Employees 61 years and older can apply for a part-time pension up to the age of 65. The employers decide if they will accept or reject the application. They may also encourage employees to apply or discourage them from doing so. We have a data set covering all employees of the age groups who are eligible and a rich data set with information on the employees and also on the units (departments) who in practice decide if an application should be accepted or not. We find that both the effects on pension wealth of taking a part-time pension, and the economic situation of the department are important for the propensity for becoming a part-time pensioner. Also individual characteristics such as gender, age, earnings and occupation are important.
This paper is an analysis of the various part-time pension schemes in Sweden and relates the syst... more This paper is an analysis of the various part-time pension schemes in Sweden and relates the systems and the changes in them to the development of part-time work. Sweden had a special partial pension scheme between 1976 and 2001. One intention behind the introduction of the system was to increase labour supply. It was one of three part-time pension schemes in the social security system. The three schemes have been: 1) A partial early old-age pension (leading to a lower pension even after 65), 2) A partial disability pension, and 3) The special part-time pension scheme (which does not lead to a lower pension after 65). The possibility of combining pension and work may be seen as a part of the Swedish welfare state and a part of a strong commitment to the work principle. The special partial pension scheme became very popular with a high take-up rate and was criticized for being too expensive. As a part of the decision on the old age pension scheme in 1994, the partial pension scheme was made less generous. It was also decided that the scheme would be totally abolished from year 2001. The other two options for combining work and receiving a pension will continue. The far less generous rules from 1995 led to a reduction in the take-up rates of partial pensions. The number of people who take a partial early old age pension has increased but not to a large extent. The takeup rate of part-time disability pensions has increased among those aged 60 to 64, but not so much that it compensates for the abolishment of the special part-time effect. In this paper an evaluation is made of the full-scale experiment with a subsidized parttime pension system. The results indicate that the effect that people continue to work part-time instead of taking an early exit route is larger than the effect that people who would have continued to work full-time until ordinary retirement age instead work parttime. According to the estimates the total labour supply measured in hours increased. The special partial pension scheme was not only popular among employees but also among employers as a way for them to facilitate work-force restructuring. This may partially explain why the authority of state employers reached an agreement with the trade unions on a new employer-financed partial pension scheme. This scheme has been in force since January 1, 2003. Unions in other sectors of the economy have argued for similar agreements but have not yet reached any results.
Journal of International Migration and Integration, Jul 7, 2011
Self-employment is very common among some immigrant groups in Sweden and many of them hire co-nat... more Self-employment is very common among some immigrant groups in Sweden and many of them hire co-nationals in their firms. One reason might be that they want to give newly arrived co-nationals the possibility to earn an income. But what are the consequences for the employees of being employed by a co-national? This paper analyzes the impact on labour income and future employment prospects of being employed by self-employed co-nationals shortly after arrival to Sweden. We find that immigrants in this group have substantially lower incomes than newly arrived immigrants with other forms of employment. We also find that they are less likely to work as employees in the private sector (other than being employed by a self-employed) in the future and are much more likely to become self-employed.
Sweden Have Such Low Incomes? * When studying income differences and income distribution, the sel... more Sweden Have Such Low Incomes? * When studying income differences and income distribution, the self-employed are often excluded from the population studied. There are several good reasons for this, for example that incomes from self-employment are not reported to the same extent as incomes from being an employee. On the other hand it is a problem to exclude the self-employed when studying income differences if the group is large, if the share that is self-employed differs between groups and if there is a difference in the average income from self-employment compared to the average wage income. This is the case when we study incomes for immigrants in Western Europe. The immigrants are overrepresented among the selfemployed, self-employed immigrants are in other sectors than self-employed natives, and the incomes from self-employment differ from the incomes of the wage earners. In this paper we look at the incomes for the self-employed in Denmark and Sweden. To minimize the problems with unreported income we will mainly compare the annual incomes of the selfemployed immigrants and their native counterparts. The measurement error should only create a bias in the estimate of the income difference between the groups if there is a systematic difference in how they report their incomes. Using two cross-sections, one for each country, we find large income differences between natives and immigrants in both countries. Regression estimates show that most characteristics have the same influence in the two countries but also some interesting differences. Using quantile regressions we find that the difference in annual incomes differs depending on where in the income distribution we look. We find that the difference is smaller higher up in the distribution.
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Papers by Eskil Wadensjö