The post Basic Income Feasibility Study appeared first on SRDC.

In 2022, LEAP launched The Equity Opportunity (TEO), a five-year initiative to scale innovative, high-impact programs working to advance women’s economic well-being, particularly those from equity-deserving groups. Through TEO, LEAP is providing eight social ventures with scaling strategy and execution support, which includes intensive long-term engagements with their team and access to top-tier pro-bono professional services.

SRDC has been engaged to evaluate LEAP’s impact measurement framework, the efficacy of TEO’s design and delivery, and early progress toward the initiative’s impact goals. We are also providing support to help ensure the integrity of LEAP’s self-assessment data and practices and bolster social ventures’ own impact measurement. Results will support LEAP’s reporting on TEO outputs and outcomes to Women and Gender Equality Canada (WAGE) as a project funder.

The post The Equity Opportunity Evaluation appeared first on SRDC.

This project aimed to fill a knowledge gap on the experiences of people with disabilities with respect to career mobility. It was conducted in support of advancing the Government of Canada’s Employment Strategy for Persons with Disabilities and Disability Inclusion Action Plan.

Career Mobility of People with Disabilities included a literature review and interviews with stakeholders such as employment service providers, experts, career practitioners, employers, and people with disabilities. It drew on both Canadian and international studies and applied a Gender-based Analysis Plus (or intersectional) lens to capture the intersections between disabilities, gender, and race.

The post Career Mobility of People with Disabilities appeared first on SRDC.

The post Demonstrating the Results of Labour Market Agreements in Canada appeared first on SRDC.

• A Financial Incentive to Encourage Employment Among Repeat Users of Employment Insurance
• Employment Insurance and Family Response to Unemployment: Canadian Evidence from the SLID
• Employment Insurance And Geographic Mobility: Evidence From The SLID
• Essays on the Repeat Use of Unemployment Insurance
• Implementing ESP: A Test of a re-Employment Incentive
• Seasonal Employment and Reliance on Employment Insurance: Evidence from the SLID
• Testing a re-Employment Incentive for Displaced Workers
• The Dynamics of Reliance on EI Benefits: Evidence from the SLID
• The Frequent Use of Unemployment Insurance in Canada
• The Impact of the Allowable Earnings Provision on EI Dependency
• Understanding Employment Insurance Claim Patterns: Final Report Of ESP
• Who Benefits from Unemployment Insurance in Canada: Regions, Industries, or Individual Firms?

The post Earnings Supplement Project (ESP) appeared first on SRDC.

This widely recognized randomized experimental study was funded by Human Resources and Skills Development Canada (HRSDC) and conducted by the Social Research and Demonstration Corporation (SRDC).

Methodology

SSP offered substantial supplements to the earnings of single-parents who had been IA recipients three or more years, but only on the condition that they left welfare for full-time work within 12 months of becoming eligible for the supplement.

To measure the effects of this financial incentive, SSP was designed as a social experiment using a rigorous random assignment research design. Single parents in southern New Brunswick and the lower mainland of British Columbia were selected at random from IA records. Half were randomly assigned to a program group and offered the SSP supplement, while the remainder formed a comparison group. Because the two groups were similar in all other respects, the “impact” or effect of SSP can be measured by the difference between the program and comparison groups’ subsequent experiences. The supplement program ran from November 1992 until December 1999, and enrolled roughly 9,000 volunteers.

SSP was comprised of three linked studies — the Recipient SSP study, the SSP Plus study, and the Applicant study.

The Recipient SSP study targeted long-term IA recipients who had been receiving welfare for at least one year, and for most, a much longer period of time. It measured the effects of the financial incentive alone.

The SSP Plus study targeted a similar group, but only in New Brunswick, and assessed the effects of the same financial incentive offered in combination with employment-related services.

The Applicant study offered new IA applicants in British Columbia the supplement if they remained on welfare for one year before leaving IA in the following 12 months for full-time employment.

In each of these studies, the supplement was generous. The combination of supplement and earnings approximately doubled the income that an individual would receive from a full-time job at minimum wage. Individuals had one year to find full-time employment in order to receive the supplement. The one-year “clock” started at random assignment in the Recipient and SSP Plus studies, and one-year after random assignment in the Applicant study. Participants could receive the supplement for up to 36 months after their first supplement payment but only in those months when they worked full time and did not receive IA.

Findings

The experimental research has been completed. All three studies showed that SSP is a “triple winner.” SSP increased employment earnings and reduced IA receipt and poverty. A large portion of the cost of SSP was offset by IA savings and by the additional income tax revenues generated by employment earnings and supplement payments. The program produced its biggest effects immediately after the close of the one-year period limit for finding full-time employment. In all three studies, the effects of the supplement had a substantial but declining effect over subsequent years.

In the Recipient study, one third of the program group took up the supplement. As a result, SSP nearly doubled the full-time employment rate in the second year after random assignment, increasing it to 29 per cent. In the same year employment earnings rose by more than one third, and welfare receipt fell by 13 percentage points. Moreover, SSP raised incomes for these poor families, creating a substantial anti-poverty effect during the period of supplement receipt. Impacts remained substantial during the period of supplement receipt, but became relatively small after that period.

Overall, SSP had few effects on children of participants in the Recipient study. Their parents’ return to work has had no negative consequences on their lives. Overall, SSP had no effect on very young children and a number of small positive effects for school-age children. For adolescents, the program had few effects, and those that it did have appeared to be initially negative, but no longer-term negative effects were detected.

In the Applicant Study, 58 per cent of new welfare applicants remained on welfare for one year and became eligible for the supplement if they found full-time work within the next year. Half of the eligible recipients did so (27 per cent of the entire program group), and received at least one supplement payment. The impacts were largest in Year 3, when SSP reduced IA receipt by 10 percentage points and increased full-time employment by 12 percentage points. SSP substantially increased earnings through to the sixth year of the follow-up period, and reduced poverty throughout much of the follow-up period. Program impacts on IA receipt and full-time employment persisted for five years. During the last of these years, no program group members received the supplement. The total cost of SSP for welfare applicants, (including supplement payments and operating costs) was almost completely offset by increased tax revenue and decreased welfare benefits. There was a small net cost to the government budget of $660 — or $110 per year — per program group member over the full six-year follow-up period. SSP also produced larger financial gains for program group members of the Applicant study than for program group members of the Recipient study, and was also much more cost effective. However, the net costs of the Recipient study are modest compared with other transfer programs.

SSP Plus combined the SSP earnings supplement with services to help people find and keep jobs. This combination resulted in larger effects than did the earnings supplement alone. About half of the people offered this SSP Plus program were able to take up the supplement offer. Many of the people who took up the supplement offer due to the effect of the SSP Plus services also lost their new jobs quickly. However, the effects of SSP Plus were remarkably strong near the end of the follow-up period, when parents were no longer eligible for SSP’s earnings supplement. This finding suggests that the job-related services had helped some members of the SSP Plus program find more stable employment than their counterparts who did not receive services.

Status

The evaluation of SSP has been completed and final SRDC evaluation reports have been released. A series of analyses using SSP data were commissioned to further study the lives of single parents on welfare, and findings from this research were released in the SRDC Working Papers series. SSP came to an end on March 31, 2006.

Funding

SSP was funded by Human Resources and Skills Development Canada (HRSDC).

The post Self-Sufficiency Project (SSP) appeared first on SRDC.

The project is being led by the Canadian Community Economic Development Network (CCEDNet) in partnership with SRDC and the National Association of Friendship Centres (NAFC). The project aims to recruit 100 Indigenous youth, new immigrants, young people living in poverty, those who identify as LGBTQ2S+, young people with disabilities, racialized youth, youth in rural/remote communities, and official language minority youth.

SRDC is supporting the project design, coordinating tailored supports to participants, and leading the project’s evaluation activities. The evaluation is examining how the placement opportunities facilitate the transition of young people to secure employment in the labour market through the development of skills, workplace experience, professional networks, and tailored wraparound supports.

It is also examining how hosting the youth placements will support the capacity and sustainability of innovative social purpose organizations across Canada to hire youth facing barriers from the communities they serve, connect to regional Social Innovation and Social Finance ecosystems, and leverage investments of the Investment Readiness Program and Social Finance Fund.

The post CreateAction: Inclusive Social Innovation appeared first on SRDC.

The post Increasing Access to Benefits for Peoples with Disabilities appeared first on SRDC.

The post Social Finance Fund (SFF) Impact Reporting Template appeared first on SRDC.

The post Literature Review on Effective Labour Market Programs and Services to Assist Youth and Social Assistance Recipients to Integrate into the Labour Market appeared first on SRDC.