Research project The dualization of social rights in Sweden and beyond

Benefit dualization is an increasingly pressing issue in Sweden. It is the result of inadequate design of out-of-work benefits that disproportionally favors labor market insiders with generous income compensation while disadvantaging outsiders with less or no benefits. This ultimately leads to greater income inequality not only within but also outside of employment.

This project investigates to what degree social policy fails to mitigate this discrepancy and provide an answer to the question of how income inequality is either mitigated or perpetuated by benefit design, particularly with respect to institutional social rights.

A novel database that captures social rights for different segments of the labor market by taking group-specific characteristics into account is developed. The data comprises the level of income replacement, recipiency duration, extent of coverage, and the underlying eligibility and qualification criteria for different out-of-work benefits and tiers as well as their interaction.

The sample covers data for Sweden from 1960–2023 and an additional 17 economically advanced democracies from 1990–2023. Based on this, I construct a benefit dualization index (BDI) that uniquely captures differences in social rights provision for insiders and outsiders.