report

Making social protection work for gender equality: What does it look like? How do we get there?

Submitted by pmassetti on
International Labour Organization (24.12.2024) This paper outlines the perspective and approach of the ILO’s Universal Social Protection Department to enhancing the gender-responsiveness of social protection policies, anchored in international social security standards and guided by a life-cycle approach to system-building.
Topics
Gender equality
Document Type

State of Social Protection Report 2025: The 2-Billion-Person Challenge

Submitted by pmassetti on
Social protection goes well beyond cash transfers; it includes policies and programs that bridge skill, financial, and information gaps, aiding people in securing better jobs. The three pillars of social protection—social assistance, social insurance, and labor market programs—support households and workers in handling crises, escaping poverty, facing transitions, and seizing employment opportunities. But despite a substantial expansion over the past decade, 2 billion people remain uncovered or inadequately covered across low- and middle-income countries.
Document Type

Country profiles on the rights and wellbeing of older persons: a how-to-guide from the Arab region

Submitted by pmassetti on
HelpAge International (22.03.2025) A practical guide to developing and using country profiles on the rights and wellbeing of older persons in the Arab region, based on HelpAge and UNFPA’s experience across 18 countries.
Regions / Country
arabic countries
Global challenges
Topics
Old-age pensions
Document Type

The Care Dividend: Why and How Countries Should Invest in Long-Term Care

Submitted by pmassetti on
eurohealthobservatory.who.int (03.04.2025) Long-term care often falls by the wayside in national policy dialogues. In some countries cultural norms compel families to look after older people at home. Some pundits may look at rising health care costs and argue that the public sector cannot shoulder more care responsibilities by expanding access to long-term care. Public long-term care systems are best placed to meet the needs of the present and the future than families.
Global challenges
Topics
Long-term care
Document Type

Undeclared care work in the EU: Policy approaches to a complex socioeconomic challenge

Submitted by pmassetti on
eurofound.europa.eu (25.03.2025) The scale of undeclared care work (paid care work that is lawful but not declared to public authorities) in the EU is considerable. Recent estimates suggest that 6.8 million undeclared workers provide care or household services across the EU, with 2.1 million specifically in the care sector. Undeclared care workers are predominantly women and often are migrants.
Regions / Country
Europe
Global challenges
Topics
Difficult-to-cover groups
Document Type

Dynamic Social Registries for Adaptive Social Protection in the Sahel : Four Recommendations

Submitted by pmassetti on
worldbank.org (01.03.2025) This policy note consolidates the highlights of a study funded by the Sahel Adaptive Social Protection Program (SASPP), exploring the role and operationalization of dynamic social registries in low-income and shock-prone contexts, including in the Sahel.
Regions / Country
Africa
Topics
Information and communication technology
Document Type

Making Progress on Parental Benefits in Low- and Middle-Income Countries

Submitted by pmassetti on
worldbank.org (24.03.2025) The World Bank estimates that closing the gender gap in employment would increase long-run gross domestic product (GDP) per capita by 20 percent (Pennings 2022). Realizing this achievement, however, depends not only on removing gender barriers to employment but also and most emphatically on improving the quality of women’s employment. Women’s labor force participation has been stagnant since 1990, at around 53 percent for women compared to 80 percent for men, with the largest gaps in lower-middle-income countries (World Bank 2023).
Topics
Family benefits
Document Type

Counterfactual impact evaluations of active labour market policies

Submitted by pmassetti on
oecd.org (20.03.2025) Public employment services and active labour market policies (ALMPs) have an important role to play in providing adaptable and responsive support to connect people with jobs. This policy report synthesises findings from a joint OECD-EC project on using linked administrative data to evaluate the impact of ALMPs. The report brings insights across a range of dimensions. It shows the power that evaluation brings to policymaking to design effective and efficient ALMPs. It demonstrates the necessity for high-quality and rich data, linked across registers.
Topics
Employment policies
Document Type

A Slippery Slope : The Opportunities and Risks of Digital Approaches and Technology in Social Protection Systems

Submitted by pmassetti on
worldbank.org (31.01.2025) Advances in technology have the potential to enhance social protection services delivery but come with risks, such as data privacy concerns, exclusion, and biases. To use digital technologies effectively, strong frameworks, infrastructure, and capacity are essential. Without these, technology may inadvertently harm rather than benefit the intended populations. Technology can improve access, outreach, training, monitoring, and secure payments, among others, but risks must be managed by clearly defining roles and responsibilities among stakeholders.
Global challenges
Topics
Technological transition
Document Type