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Reconciling work and family life involves two key goals for both individuals and society: being able to work, to earn an income while participating in the most important social activity of modern life, and providing the best care and nurturing for one’s own children. This first OECD review of the reconciliation of work and family life looks at the challenges parents of young children confront when trying to square their work and care commitments, and the implications for social and labour market trends. It considers the current mix of family-friendly policies in Australia, Denmark, and the Netherlands and explores how this policy balance contributes to different labour market and other societal outcomes in these three countries.

Raising children and having a career both rate highly as important life goals for many people. Helping parents to achieve these goals is vital for society: parental care plays a crucial role in child development and parental employment promotes economic prosperity. A failure to assist parents find their preferred work and family balance has implications for both labour supply and family decisions. This study considers how a wide range of policies, including tax/benefit policies, childcare policies, and employment and workplace practices, help determine parental labour market outcomes and family formation in Austria, Ireland and Japan.

This study, part of a series on OECD countries, considers how a tax/benefit and childcare policies and workplace practices help determine parental labour market outcomes and may impinge on family formation in New Zealand, Portugal and Switzerland. The book makes recommendations for policy reform aimed at a better reconciliation of work and family commitments in these three countries.

Job displacement (involuntary job loss due to firm closure or downsizing) affects many workers over their lifetime. Displaced workers may face long periods of unemployment and, even when they find new jobs, tend to be paid less and have fewer benefits than in their prior jobs. Helping them get back into good jobs quickly should be a key goal of labour market policy. This report is the fourth in a series of reports looking at how this challenge is being tackled in a number of OECD countries. It shows that many displaced workers get new jobs relatively quickly in Australia, mostly thanks to a flexible and dynamic labour market. A small minority of displaced workers receive special support via the labour adjustment programmes, but some displaced workers who would need specific assistance, in particular in the older worker and/or low-educated groups, do not get sufficient support or only too late. There is room to improve policies by moving away from the current sectoral approach to special assistance programmes for workers collectively dismissed, towards an approach covering all sectors of the economy, with the intensity of intervention tailored to the circumstances and needs of the displaced workers. Expanding the training component for displaced workers and making use of skills assessment and training to better target the training and enhance its effectiveness would also help displaced workers transition to sustainable jobs of a certain quality.

Job displacement (involuntary job loss due to firm closure or downsizing) affects many workers over their lifetime. Displaced workers may face long periods of unemployment and, even when they find new jobs, tend to be paid less than in their prior jobs. Helping them get back into good jobs quickly should be a key goal of labour market policy. This report looks at how this challenge is being tackled in Canada. While the Canadian government uses several measures to prevent unnecessary layoffs, the focus is placed on assisting workers after they have lost their job via the Employment Insurance system and the core labour market programmes operated by the Provinces. Re-employment assistance tailored to meet the specific needs of displaced workers also plays a useful role, but needs to be reinforced so as to start the adjustment process earlier for workers receiving advance notice or a large severance payment and to reach  workers affected by small-scale displacements. Targeted programmes for older displaced workers with long-tenure who are hardest hit have yet to reach a large share of this group.

Job displacement (involuntary job loss due to firm closure or downsizing) affects many workers over the course of their working lives. Displaced workers may face long periods of unemployment and, even when they find new jobs, tend to be paid less than in the jobs they held prior to displacement. Helping displaced workers get back into good jobs quickly should be a key goal of labour market policy. This report is the sixth in a series of reports looking at how this challenge is being tackled in a number of OECD countries. It shows that Denmark has effective policies in place to quickly assist people who are losing their jobs, in terms of both providing good re-employment support and securing adequate income in periods of unemployment. Despite a positive institutional framework, a sound collaboration between social partners and a favourable policy set-up, there is room to improve policies targeted to displaced workers as not every worker in Denmark can benefit from the same amount of support. In particular, workers affected by collective dismissals in larger firms receive faster and better support than those in small firms or involved in small or individual dismissals. Blue-collar workers are also treated less favourably than white-collar workers. More generally, low-skilled and older displaced workers struggle most to re-enter the labour market.

Job displacement (involuntary job loss due to firm closure or downsizing) affects many workers over their lifetime. Displaced workers may face long periods of unemployment and, even when they find new jobs, tend to be paid less  and have fewer benefits than in their prior jobs. Helping them get back into good jobs quickly should be a key goal of labour market policy. This report is part of a series of nine reports looking at how this challenge is being tackled in a number of OECD countries. It shows that Finland has a higher rate of job displacement than most OECD countries but that most of these workers find a new job again relatively quickly. However, those who do not face a considerable risk of long-term unemployment; with older displaced workers and those with a low level of education facing the highest risk. While labour market institutions in Finland serve most displaced jobseekers well, there is room to improve policies for those at risk of long-term unemployment or inactivity who would benefit from earlier identification of their problems and early, effective and well-targeted counselling and intervention.

Job displacement (involuntary job loss due to firm closure or downsizing) affects many workers over the course of their working lives. Displaced workers may face long periods of unemployment and, even when they find new jobs, tend to be paid less and have fewer benefits than in the jobs they held prior to displacement. Helping displaced workers get back into good jobs quickly should be a key goal of labour market policy. This report is the second in a series of reports looking at how this challenge is being tackled in a number of OECD countries. It shows that Japanese employers and the government go to considerable lengths to avoid the displacement of regular workers while also providing considerable income and re-employment support to many of the workers whose jobs cannot be preserved. Challenges for labour market programmes include expanding labour market mobility between regular jobs, improving co-ordination between private and public re-employment assistance for displaced workers, and avoiding that job displacement pushes older workers to the margins of the labour market.

Job displacement (involuntary job loss due to firm closure or downsizing) affects many workers over their lifetime. Displaced workers may face long periods of unemployment and, even when they find new jobs, tend to be paid less and have fewer benefits than in their prior jobs. Helping them get back into good jobs quickly should be a key goal of labour market policy. This report is the fourth in a series of reports looking at how this challenge is being tackled in a number of OECD countries. It shows that Sweden has been relatively successful in minimising the adverse effects of displaced workers, manily due to the longstanding tradition of collaboration between the social partners to share responsibility for restructuring by creating special arrangements and practices that provide help to workers much faster that in other OECD countries. Despite this positive institutional framework, there is room to improve policies targeted to displaced workers as remarkable inequalities still exist in both the Swedish labour market and in the way workers are treated.
 

Job displacement (involuntary job loss due to firm closure or downsizing) affects many workers over their lifetime. Displaced workers may face long periods of unemployment and, even when they find new jobs, tend to be paid less and have fewer benefits than in their prior jobs. Helping them get back into good jobs quickly should be a key goal of labour market policy. This report is part of a series of nine reports looking at how this challenge is being tackled in a number of OECD countries. It shows that the United States has a relatively high rate of job displacement and that only one in two affected workers find a new job within one year. Older displaced workers and those with a low level of education fare worst. Contrary to most other OECD countries, displaced workers have long been a target group for policy intervention, and a number of system features, like rapid response services, are promising. But the success of US policies is limited because overall funding for the workforce development system is insufficient and because only trade-related job displacement comes with generous entitlement for training and better benefits.

Unemployment and related welfare benefits help prevent those without work from falling into poverty but at the same time reduce the incentive to work; this is one of the main dilemmas of social policy. For the first time, this publication analyses the complicated interactions of tax and benefit systems for many different family types and labour market situations. This volume enables the reader to discover exactly what features of the tax and benefit system cause disincentives to work; it compares all the different benefits made available to those without work and the taxes they pay with potential in-work incomes. In-work incomes in some countries are little higher than benefits made available to those without work. Furthermore, some benefits are withdrawn as earnings rise, reducing the attraction of moving up the job ladder. Unemployed families who face these disincentives may become locked in unemployment and are at risk of exclusion from the labour market.

Unemployment and related benefits help prevent those without work from falling into poverty but at the same time reduce the incentive to work; this is one of the main dilemmas of social policy. The Benefit Systems and Work Incentives series, started in 1998, addresses all the complicated interactions of tax and benefit systems for many different family types and labour market situations. This year's edition includes a section that describes the changes that occurred over the two-year period 1995-1997 affecting benefit systems and work incentives in OECD countries. We have also included some detailed calculations which illustrate the uses of net income calculations and the resulting marginal effective tax rates. Furthermore, Greece has now been included amongst the countries in our study. The series is a valuable tool used to compare the different benefits made available to those without work (net of taxes) with potential in-work incomes. This differential, in some countries, is very small. Furthermore, the reduction of certain benefits, as earnings rise, sometimes reduces the attraction of moving up the job ladder. Consequently unemployed families, who face these disincentives, may become locked in unemployment and are at risk of exclusion from the labour market.

Unemployment and related welfare benefits help prevent those without work from falling into poverty but at the same time, reduce the incentive to work; this is one of the main dilemmas of social policy. This annual report presents a description of all the benefits available to those without work, and of the taxes they pay, and presents a set of tables facilitating cross-country comparisons of tax-benefit systems. It compares the incomes of a range of families in and out of work in 1999 and describes the incentives to work, either part-time or full-time, across OECD countries.