Non-take-up of Social Assistance - Regional Differences and the Role of Norms: An analysis based on administrative data for the Canton of Bern

Hümbelin, Oliver (6 December 2016). Non-take-up of Social Assistance - Regional Differences and the Role of Norms: An analysis based on administrative data for the Canton of Bern (Unpublished). In: 2ème séminaire régional sur le non-recours aux droits et prestations sociales. Université de Genève. 06.12.2016.

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This study estimates prevalence of non-take-up of social assistance using administrative data from the Canton of Bern in Switzerland. It exploits regional variation in non-take-up rates to study the effect of different social norms. Social norms are proxied with the share of votes received by parties that have “social assistance” explicitly on their political agenda. As theoretically expected, non-take-up is higher in regions with high support for the right-wing Swiss People's Party and is lower with higher support for the Social Democratic Party. This association is tested against other potential explanations like the urban-rural divide, population density, economic structure, and the degree of need using multiple regression models. Sensitivity analysis is additionally carried out using methods of robust regression, but the effect remains, suggesting that social norms do indeed have an impact on take-up behavior and partly explain the nontake-up divide between rural and urban areas.

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