Unemployment Insurance for All? Social Preferences Evolution in Europe Since the Lifting of the Iron Curtain
ABSTRACT This paper examines the evolution of social preferences over government unemployment insurance in Europe. We find an ‘East‐West divide’ in attitudes towards this role of government policy, with lower support in Eastern Europe for government action to correct adverse labour‐market outcomes. This difference is associated with preference persistence among the older generation educated during communism. The younger cohort does not display the same pattern, a result consistent with cohort differences in social preferences but not sufficient, in a single cross‐section, to identify preference change over time. The results are corroborated by several tests.
Authors
- Hira Iqbal (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0006-0306-8651)
- Alexander Mihailov (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4307-4029)
- Étienne Farvaque (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9180-4594)
- Maqsood Aslam (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0385-8171)
Institutions
- Quaid-i-Azam University (PK)
- Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (FR)
- Institut d'Economie Scientifique Et de Gestion (FR)
- Lille Économie Management (FR)
- Center for Interuniversity Research and Analysis on Organizations (CA)
- University of Reading (GB)
- National University of Sciences and Technology (PK)
Publication Details
- Journal
- Economics of Transition and Institutional Change
- Published
- 2026-10-16
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1111/ecot.70054
- Primary Topic
- Social Policy and Reform Studies
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 0.00