Browse by: "A"

This report provides new evidence on social mobility in the context of increased inequalities of income and opportunities in OECD and selected emerging economies. It covers the aspects of both social mobility between parents and children and of personal income mobility over the life course, and their drivers. The report shows that social mobility from parents to offspring is low across the different dimensions of earnings, education, occupation and health, and that the same prevails for personal income mobility over the life course. There is in particular a lack of mobility at the bottom and at the top of the social ladder – with “sticky floors” preventing upward mobility for many and “sticky ceilings” associated with opportunity hoarding at the top. The lack of social mobility has economic, societal and political consequences. This report shows that there is space for policies to make societies more mobile and protect households from adverse income shocks. It discusses the options and measures that policy makers can consider how to improve social mobility across and within generations.

A new vision of the purpose of social policy is needed. Scaremongers present decision-makers as facing an overwhelming number of complex problems with more and more limited budgets. Society is indeed undergoing profound upheaval. Ageing populations are increasing pressure on the workforce. Changes in the labour market have hit low-skilled workers hard; the term "social exclusion" has entered the political lexicon, and policies can no longer be based on "traditional" family life. But social policy should not be presented as "papering over the cracks" in society caused by economic and demographic change. As knowledge plays an increasing role in generating wealth, empowering individuals to develop their potential is a central and essential part of economic policy. Indeed, economic and social policies are more intertwined than ever.
This book paints a complete and accessible picture of the current situation and pinpoints how policies can be reformed. Social policy should aim to promote employment and healthy living, rather than just coping with joblessness and ill-health. Investing in children and families helps ensure that all can contribute fully to society. Innovations and experiments in new social policies to better equip individuals and families with the support they need in responding to change abound in OECD countries. Ministers from OECD countries have committed themselves to the ambitious task of creating just such a caring world.

Over the past ten years economic growth in Asia has contributed to a reduction of poverty as well as fertility rates, and greater prosperity has contributed to gains in life expectancy. However, at present many workers still work in informal employment, frequently for long hours at little pay and without social protection coverage. A growing demand for social support, extending the coverage of social protection benefits and improving the job quality of workers will be among Asia’s major challenges in future. This report considers these challenges, providing policy examples from countries to illustrate good practice, including Bangladesh, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Pakistan, Singapore and Viet Nam.

What approach to treating certain ageing-related diseases works best and at what cost? That is, what combination of health care system characteristics, prevention, detection, technology and treatment, is the most cost-effective? The OECD Ageing-Related Diseases study investigated how health systems treat three diseases: ischemic heart disease, stroke and breast cancer. This book includes papers discussing the results of the OECD study with essays by leading experts, and uses a disease-based approach to comparing health-systems.

As ageing societies are pushing a growing number of frail old people into needing care, delivering quality long-term care services – care that is safe, effective, and responsive to needs – has become a priority for governments. Yet much still remains to be done to enhance evidence-based measurement and improvement of quality of long-term care services across EU and OECD countries. This book offers evidence and examples of useful experiences to help policy makers, providers and experts measure and improve the quality of long-term care services.

Mental ill-health affects millions of people, and drives economic costs of more than 4% of GDP. A good mental health system helps people stay in good mental health, and connects those in need to appropriate support to manage their mental health condition or even fully recover from it. However, mental health care has long been neglected and under-funded, and unmet need for care is still high. The long-lasting COVID-19 crisis and the toll it is taking on mental health has made mental health systems more important than ever. This timely report provides an in-depth analysis of how well countries are delivering the policies and services that matter for mental health system performance. The report highlights recent reforms countries have taken to strengthen mental health performance, including by increasing access to mental health care, ensuring that service users take the lead in planning and even delivering services, and prioritising integration and mental health promotion. The report also identifies promising approaches countries should pursue to better meet their populations’ mental health needs. This report sets up a framework for understanding mental health performance through internationally comparable indicators, an approach set to grow stronger still in the coming years as more data become available.

Three billion people live in rural areas in developing countries. Conditions for them are worse than for their urban counterparts when measured by almost any development indicator, from extreme poverty, to child mortality and access to electricity and sanitation. And the gulf is widening, contributing to large-scale migration to urban areas. This situation exists despite half a century of rural development theories and approaches, and despite the global momentum built around the Millennium Development Goals between 2000 and 2015. Without greater progress on rural development, it is unlikely that the new Sustainable Development Goals will be met. This book calls for a new paradigm for rural development that is equipped to meet the challenges and harness the opportunities of the 21st century – including climate change, demographic shifts, international competition and fast-moving technological change.

In recent years, Georgia has undergone important economic, social and political transformations. Given the significant emigration of the Georgian population and the recognition of the contributions of the diaspora, Georgian authorities are seeking to better understand this pool of talent residing abroad, which has great potential to contribute to the economic and social development of Georgia. This review provides the first comprehensive portrait of Georgian emigrants in OECD countries. By profiling Georgian emigrants, this review aims to strengthen knowledge about this community and thus help to consolidate the relevance of the policies deployed by Georgia towards its emigrants.

In recent years, Ghana has undergone major economic, social and political transformations. Given the significant emigration of the Ghanaian population and the recognition of the contributions of the diaspora, Ghanaian authorities are seeking to better understand this pool of talent residing abroad, which has great potential to contribute to the economic and social development of Ghana. This review provides the first comprehensive portrait of the Ghanaian diaspora in OECD countries. By profiling Ghanaian emigrants, this review aims to strengthen knowledge about this community and thus help to consolidate the relevance of the policies deployed by Ghana towards its emigrants.

In recent years, Indonesia has undergone major economic, social and political transformations. Given the significant emigration of the Indonesian population and the recognition of the contributions of the diaspora, Indonesian authorities are seeking to better understand this pool of talent residing abroad, which has great potential to contribute to the economic and social development of Indonesia. This review provides the first comprehensive portrait of the Indonesian diaspora in OECD countries. By profiling Indonesian emigrants, this review aims to strengthen knowledge about this community and thus help to consolidate the relevance of the policies deployed by Indonesia towards its emigrants.

A System of Health Accounts 2011: Revised Edition provides an updated and systematic description of the financial flows related to the consumption of health care goods and services. As demands for information increase and more countries implement and institutionalise health accounts according to the system, the data produced are expected to be more comparable, more detailed and more policy relevant. It builds on the original OECD Manual, published in 2000, and the Guide to Producing National Health Accounts to create a single global framework for producing health expenditure accounts that can help track resource flows from sources to uses. It is the result of a collaborative effort between the OECD, WHO and the European Commission, and sets out in more detail the boundaries, the definitions and the concepts – responding to health care systems around the globe – from the simplest to the more complicated.

Current population trends and the COVID-19 pandemic reinforce the need for efficient public service provision while guaranteeing good access to all. Population decline and ageing in rural regions affect the provision of services through lower economies of scale and scope, professional shortages and longer distances. Reliable estimates of the costs and access arising from demographic and geographical differences can help adapt the provision of services to different territorial realities. This report provides internationally comparable fine-grained present and future estimates of the cost and physical access to education (primary and secondary) and health services (cardiology, maternity and obstetrics) in European countries. The report finds that demographic change in the next decades will likely further strain the trade-off between costs and access, especially in remote rural areas. Adapting to changes in demand following lower fertility rates and ageing implies that services will need to become more widely available, while others will have to concentrate more. This report aims to support evidence-based policy decisions to ensure service provision allows for both cost efficiency and a sufficient level of access in all territories.

Rising public health care spending remains a problem in virtually all OECD and EU member countries. As a consequence, there is growing interest in policies that will ease this pressure through improved health system performance. This report examines selected policies that may help countries better achieve the goal of improved health system efficiency and thus better value for money. Drawing on multinational data sets and case studies, it examines a range policy instruments. These include: the role of competition in health markets; the scope for improving care coordination; better pharmaceutical pricing policies; greater quality control supported by stronger information and communication technology in health care; and increased cost sharing.

Despite the increasingly protracted nature of situations of forced displacement, development policy makers and practitioners have tended to overlook the longevity of displacement. Forced displacement has long been viewed primarily as an emergency humanitarian issue by providers of development co-operation and the focus of the international community has predominantly been on addressing the immediate protection and short-term humanitarian needs of forcibly displaced persons. However, with increasing levels of new and protracted displacement, and key commitments such as the 2030 Agenda, donors are looking at the role of development actors and financing in supporting sustainable and comprehensive solutions to forced displacement. This Guidance, therefore, provides a clear and practical introduction to the challenges faced in working in situations of forced displacement, and provides guidance to donor staff seeking to mainstream responses to forced displacement into development planning and co-operation. While recognising that donor policies and responses are constantly evolving, this guidance proposes that donors responding to these situations prioritise three broad areas of work, where they can best contribute to existing capacities at the national, regional and global levels. It also identifies twelve actions, grouped under four key principles, outlining what donors can do to reinforce the capacities of key actors to respond to refugees and Internally Displaced Persons at the national, regional and global levels, and to advance comprehensive solutions.

Kazakhstan has recorded impressive economic growth rates since its independence, driven mainly by export of commodities and high rate of energy use. These rates are not sustainable and are generating significant air pollution, in particular from industrial stationary sources. This is putting at risk the country’s development ambitions to become one of the top global economies by 2050 and converge towards OECD living standards. Building on OECD previous analysis, this publication shows that Kazakhstan’s environmental payments (environmentally related taxes, non-compliance penalties and compensation for damage regulation) for industrial air pollutants, as currently applied, impede energy efficiency and pollution abatement with heavy-handed non-compliance responses and focus on rising revenues. They also add to the cost of doing businesses in the country with limited environmental benefit. In the spirit of the Polluter-Pays Principle, much more reforms of regulation of environmental payments are needed. This report provides guidelines for reform drawing from air pollution regulations in OECD member countries and the results of the analysis of the system in Kazakhstan carried out by the OECD in close co-operation with the Government of Kazakhstan.

In many countries, public expenditure, including transfers, plays a major role in reducing income inequality. The report reviews the various ways that budgeting can be used to this end. A first includes taking a broad approach to results-based budgeting, taking social and distributional goals into consideration. A second relies on integrating distributional impact analysis directly into the budget process. The report discusses the concrete experience of eight OECD countries in this area, analysing how they are integrating distributional impact assessment in spending and budgeting decisions. Finally, it discusses the tools, frameworks and data that are needed to take distributional considerations into account as part of evidence-informed policy making.