Petra Thiemann
Associate senior lecturer
Financial Work Incentives for Disability Benefit Recipients : Lessons from a Randomized Experiment
Author
Summary, in English
Disability insurance (DI) beneficiaries lose part or all of their benefits if earnings exceed certain thresholds (“cash-cliffs”). This implicit taxation is considered the prime reason for the low number of beneficiaries who expand work and reduce benefit receipt. We analyse a conditional cash programme that incentivises work related reductions of disability benefits in Switzerland. Four thousand DI beneficiaries received an offer to claim up to CHF 72,000 (USD 77,000) if they expand work and reduce benefits. Initial reactions to the programme announcement, measured by call-back rates, are modest. By the end of the field phase, the take-up rate is only 0.5 %.
Publishing year
2015
Language
English
Pages
1-18
Publication/Series
IZA Journal of Labor Policy
Volume
4
Issue
18
Full text
- Available as PDF - 698 kB
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Document type
Journal article
Publisher
Springer
Topic
- Economics
Keywords
- Disability insurance
- Field experiment
- Financial incentive
- Return-to-work
- H55
- J14
- C93
- D04
Status
Published
ISBN/ISSN/Other
- ISSN: 2193-9004