Abstract

Social protection can include a range of entitlements to monetary and in-kind benefits. Eurofound’s project focuses on unemployment and minimum income benefits. Social protection can provide a safety net for people who are negatively impacted by the green and digital transitions. During the COVID-19 pandemic, social protection was strengthened temporarily, but it also triggered long-term changes. The cost-of-living crisis, with high levels of inflation, came with challenges in terms of adequacy of benefits. This led to the implementation of short-term and longer-term measures to address these challenges. In this project, Eurofound maps recent trends in minimum income and unemployment scheme coverage and adequacy, and the characteristics of recipients. It identifies groups that are in vulnerable situations due to non-entitlement, non-take-up and inadequacy. Activation measures are discussed, especially with regard to sanctions as a result of non-compliance. The digitalisation of application procedures and its impact on access are also discussed. Finally, the project investigates how service entitlements, such as healthcare and public transport, are tied to these benefits and examines the automatic nature of these entitlements.

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