Work Norms and the Welfare State

Work norms and the welfare state

Many European countries still provide their citizens with social insurance programs of unprecedented generosity. A cultural critique of the welfare state contends that generous social insurance has detrimental effects on work norms. This paper revisits the model of endogenous work ethic developed by Lindbeck and Nyberg (2006) and explores survey evidence on the relationship between social spend...

Voluntary Work in the Welfare State

Part-Time Work and Work Norms in the Netherlands

We argue that in the Netherlands, due to the growth of part-time work, work norms have declined. The mechanism behind this norm change is in the changed organization of family life. The increased labour market participation of women has put the traditional organization of family life under pressure. Working mothers in the Netherlands opt for part-time jobs, thus sacrificing career opportunities...

The Welfare State and Competitiveness

In all modern industrial countries, redistributive expenditures are a larger component of the government budget than consumption of goods and services. In this paper, we use a general equilibrium, two-country model with exportables, importables and nontraclables to study redistribution across different types of agents in a world characterized by the presence of labor unions and distortionary ta...

The Welfare State and Redistribution

Because it taxes and spends, the welfare state is by definition redistributive, but this does not automatically entail that it creates more equality. A quick historical glance at social reform will dispel of any notion that the welfare state was pursued for egalitarian reasons. Its foundations were typically laid by conservative reformers who, like Bismarck, sought primarily to reproduce, rathe...