Tim Goedemé

Family Financial Stress, Parenting and Problem Behavior in Adolescents: An Actor-Partner Interdependence Approach

In this study, we examine how financial stress is associated with problem behavior in adolescents through the lives of their parents. Using an actor–partner interdependence model, we explore pathways within (actor) and between (partner) parents. Our data included 340 families, with both parents rating their financial stress, depressive symptoms, and interparental conflict, and with parents and adolescents rating parenting and problem behavior in adolescents. The results indicate that the association between financial stress and problem behavior in adolescents is mediated by depressive symptoms, interparental conflict, and positive parenting. Another finding is that financial stress has direct and indirect effects on interparental conflict. Furthermore, the impact of financial stress on positive parenting is greater for fathers than it is for mothers. Although actor effects are more prominent, there is also evidence of partner effects. Our results underscore the importance of including multiple family members in studies on family stress processes.

Towards cross-country comparable reference budgets in Europe : first results of a concerted effort

In Europe, reference budgets are increasingly recognised as a helpful tool for policy making and monitoring. If developed in a cross-country comparable way, reference budgets could, in addition, prove to be useful for cross-national learning and contextualising the EU social indicators. However, current reference budgets are not comparable across countries. In this article we report on the first results of a concerted effort to construct comparable reference budgets for adequate social participation in Antwerp, Athens, Barcelona, Budapest, Helsinki and Milan. We start from a single theoretical and methodological framework and carefully track differences in institutional settings, climate, culture, and the availability and prices of goods and services that justify crosscountry variations in the contents and levels of reference budgets. Results indicate that adequate social participation requires access to different goods and services in the six cities, but that, at the same time, the needs to be fulfilled are rather similar, such that the variation in the level of reference budgets is less than what would be expected on the basis of differences in median household incomes. Results also show that constructing comparable reference budgets requires substantial and intensive coordination. We suggest directions in which our approach to their construction could be improved.

A Universal Basic Pension for Europe's Elderly: Options and Pitfalls

In this article we explore the implementation of a European basic pension (BP) scheme as a means of combating financial poverty of Europes elderly. As earlier contributions already outlined the practical and ethical arguments that favour a European basic income, we assume that a basic income is philosophically and ethically justified and that the European Union has a crucial role to play in its implementation. In this article, we broaden the scope of the discussion to examining the various (and often technical) options, difficulties and pitfalls associated with the practical design and implementation of a harmonised European minimum income scheme. We first offer an overview of minimum income guarantees for the elderly in Europe. Second, we make a detailed assessment of the issues involved in the design of a BP. Third, we shed some light on the European dimension of this proposal and conclude with a sketch of three possible BP scenarios. Our findings confirm that it is one thing to be in favour of BP, but another to design a realistic and politically feasible proposal.

The EU Convergence Machine at Work. To the Benefit of the EU's Poorest Citizens?

Social cohesion in the EU (European Union) is usually assessed on the basis of GDP per capita and relative poverty rates. These indicators show that the ‘European convergence machine’ led to greater social cohesion between old and new Member States (EU‐15 and NMS) until the onset of the crisis. In this article we offer an alternative perspective by directly comparing EU citizens’ disposable household incomes. Using four waves of EU‐SILC data, we explore what happened between 2005 and 2011 in the EU‐15 and NMS regarding changes in the lowest household incomes in relation to the EU‐wide median. Results show that, overall, the convergence machine seemed to work well for the lowest incomes in the NMS, but not so much for those living in the EU‐15. At the same time, differences in living standards remain quite large. This points to important continued challenges for EU policy initiatives in the social domain.

Measuring water affordability in developed economies. The added value of a needs-based approach

In developed countries, water affordability problems remain up on the agenda as the increasing financial costs of water services can impede the realisation of an equal access to water. More than ever, public authorities that define water tariffs face the challenge of reconciling environmental and cost recovery objectives with equity and financial accessibility for all. Indicators of water affordability can be helpful in this regard. Conventional affordability indicators often rely on the actual amount that households spend on water use. In contrast, we propose a needs-based indicator that measures the risk of being unable to afford the amount of water necessary to fulfill essential needs, i.e. needs that should be fulfilled for adequate participation in society. In this paper we set forth the methodological choices inherent to constructing a needs-based affordability indicator. Using a micro-dataset on households in Flanders (Belgium), we compare its results with the outcomes of a more common actual expenses-indicator. The paper illustrates how the constructed needs-based indicator can complement existing affordability indicators, and its capacity to reveal important risk groups.

Standard error estimation in EU-SILC – First resultsof the Net-SILC2 project

Within the total survey error paradigm (TSE) one no rmally tries to identify the principal sources of e rror in a survey, e.g. errors due to coverage, sampling, nonresponse, measurement, processing and imputation, a nd of course issues pertaining to validity or relevanc e. The impacts of these errors are mitigated when p ossible, or at least we should try to characterize them and their sources (Groves, 2004). Statistical disclosur e control (SDC) methods, i.e. measures taken to protect confi de tial data can be viewed as an additional error s ou ce, and in some cases this is exactly how risk reductio n is achieved, e.g. noise is purposely added to mic ro or tabular data. Similarly, when protection is achieve d by suppressing data, uncertainty is introduced. Consequently, Karr (2012) includes disclosure limit ation error as a component of TSE at the conceptual level. This uncertainty may consist of an increase in variances but may also introduce bias in estimat es stemming from a protected data set. The main differ ence compared to other error sources is that the producers of official statistics are in a position t assess the increase of uncertainty and decide ho w much to add and attempt to do so in a controlled manner. Op timally, uncertainty is added while at the same tim e the utility of the data is preserved, thus there is an intention from the producer to find a balance betwe n risk and utility.

Standard error estimation and related sampling issues

Evidence about poverty persistence is an important complement to information about poverty prevalence at a point in time. The persistent at-risk-of-poverty rate is one of the primary indicators of social inclusion, and the only indicator that is derived using samples from the longitudinal component of EU-SILC. Sample drop-out from the longitudinal samples (‘attrition’) reduces sample size thereby decreasing the precision of estimates of persistent poverty indicators, and may be selective and lead to bias. We examine these issues. We show that rates of attrition from the four-year EU-SILC samples used to calculate persistent poverty rates vary substantially across Member States, and there is also substantial cross-national diversity in the characteristics of individuals lost to follow-up. We provide evidence that application of longitudinal weights does not fully account for the effects of attrition, and that different assumptions about the poverty status of attritors lead to wide bounds for estimates of persistent poverty rates for most Member StatesThe paper presents the current state of progress of the Net-SILC2 work package dealing with standard error estimation and other related sampling issues in EU-SILC. The aim of this work package is to develop a handbook with a concrete set of recommendations both for data providers and data users with regard to standard error estimation. The increased complexity of EU-SILC, the widening of the user community and the increased reliance on EU-SILC for policy targeting and evaluation have enhanced the need for comparable, accurate as well as workable solutions for the estimation of standard errors and confidence intervals. After presenting the variance estimation methodology which has been recommended, the paper shows numerical results obtained for some of the EU-SILC key indicators.

Water expenses by households living in Flanders : data availability in the Belgian EU-SILC

Few data sources in developed countries contain for a representative sample of households information on water expenses alongside a rich set of reliable information on individual and household characteristics. In this Data in Brief we describe the Belgian EU-SILC data, which we used for ‘Measuring water affordability in developing economies. The added value of a needs-based approach’ (Vanhille et al., 2018) [1]. EU-SILC can be obtained from the Belgian National Statistical Institute and is the most important representative household survey on income and living conditions in the European Union, and contains, among others, an advanced measurement of household income. It is not well-known, though, that national datasets often contain more information, making them suitable for studies that are somewhat outside the ‘core scope’ of EU-SILC. One example is studying the consumption of water by households, as can be done for Belgium. In this article we briefly introduce the Belgian EU-SILC and present the data on water expenses for households living in Flanders. In 2015, 50 per cent less than 23 EUR on water, while 90 per cent spent less than 45 EUR on water.

Can reference budgets be used as a poverty line

The most common indicator to measure and compare the extent of poverty within and across European countries is the well-known at-risk-of-poverty indicator. Although the relative income-based measure is widely used, over time it has been the target of considerable criticism. In this paper, reference budgets are introduced as a valuable complementary indicator, since they illustrate the cost of baskets of goods and services that are essential to participate adequately in society. When constructed in a comparable way, they show which standard of living can be achieved at the level of the at-risk-of-poverty threshold in different countries, taking account of out-of-pocket costs of public goods and services. In this paper, we draw on data from cross-nationally comparable reference budgets in three reference cities (Antwerp, Barcelona and Helsinki) to illustrate how RBs can be used to evaluate other poverty indicators and to construct complementary poverty thresholds. At the same time, we explain that there are important challenges to address, including (1) the limited number of specific household types for which reference budgets are developed, (2) problems of robustness and comparability, and (3) the lack of important information in the EU-SILC microdata for our purposes. Acknowledging these limitations, this paper provides a first illustrative attempt to estimate of the number of people with a disposable income below the RB threshold for densely populated areas in Belgium, Finland and Spain.The results show how the at-risk-of-poverty threshold does not represent the same level of living standard across EU Member States, and probably underestimates the out-of-pocket cost of an adequate living standard in Spain. First estimates indicate that families renting on the private market, families with children and young people are relatively worse off when poverty is measured with the reference budget indicator as compared to the at-risk-of-poverty indicator. If these results are confirmed in future research, this may have important implications for anti-poverty policies.

Book Review: Progress for the Poor; Poverty and Deprivation in EuropeKenworthyL.Progress for the Poor, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2011, ISBN 978-0-19-959152-7, 176 pp., £40.00 (hbk) and NolanB.WhelanC.T.Poverty and Deprivation in Europe, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2011, ISBN 978-0-19-958843-5, 288 pp., £55.00 (hbk)

emphasizing (see for example pp. 40–41, 281). This seems implausible, if only for the reason that discussions about immigrants’ social rights invoke a set of considerations regarding national identity and belonging that are absent in, say, a debate on pension reform. Second, the large number of explanations risks making the overall theoretical model unparsimonious and unspecified. In a comparison of six cases, a total of seven independent variables are theorized to be of relevance. But there is little discussion of the relative leverage of each of these variables, their interaction, or the stage in the causal sequence they can be expected to be most important. And again, the limited amount of space dedicated to conceptualization makes it hard to understand the causal claims. For example, the immigrant incorporation regime is identified as one of the main determinants of immigrants’ social rights, but at times immigrants’ social rights are themselves included as an aspect of the incorporation regime. (In fact, the term is defined as the ‘rules and norms that govern immigrants’ possibilities to ... participate in economic, cultural, and political life’; p. 16, emphasis mine.) Finally, because of Sainsbury’s attention to detail, the six case studies vary greatly from each other. This is not only a matter of overall length (for example, Denmark only receives half the attention that Sweden does). In some case studies, we find distinctions between the rights of temporary migrants and permanent residents, while those discussions are absent elsewhere. Some chapters feature the distinction between different types of transfer benefits (such as means-tested versus contributory programs), but others do not. And finally, the treatment of the independent variables varies greatly from one case study to the next. To give just one example, political parties appear as an important part of the French chapter, but are hardly discussed at all in the American and Scandinavian case studies. The reader is left wondering why different cases deserve such a different treatment. Of course, it is understandable that Welfare States and Immigrant Rights does not answer all the questions we might have about how and when immigrants’ social rights change. As the first book-long comparative study on the subject, we should first and foremost appreciate the wealth of information it offers on a phenomenon we know very little about.