The importance of non-standard employment forms has increased over the last decades. Janine Leschke addresses two important questions in this regard. First, do workers with part-time and temporary contracts face greater risks of becoming unemployed than those with regular contracts? Secondly, how far are they disadvantaged in terms of access to and level of unemployment benefits? The author compares the design of unemployment benefit systems in Denmark, Germany, Spain, and the United Kingdom. After discussing the development and role of non-standard employment in these countries, she examines the relevant features of unemployment insurance systems such as hours and earning thresholds and minimum contribution requirements. Her empirical analysis shows that non-standard workers are more likely to become unemployed or inactive and are disadvantaged in their entitlements to unemployment benefits.

Unemployment Insurance (UI) is one the nation's most effective anti-poverty and economic stabilization measures. Unfortunately, the number of workers receiving benefits has substantially declined in recent decades. This Note probes one likely cause of this phenomenon that scholars have mostly ignored: the rise of non-standard employment, including part-time, temporary, contract, on-call, and independent contract work. Like many New Deal programs, UI was designed to aid individuals with long-term, full-time jobs. It is therefore poorly adapted to a non-standard workforce characterized by low wages, uncertain schedules, and short-lived assignments. Indeed, the analysis shows that UI's monetary eligibility criteria, non-monetary eligibility requirements, outreach mechanisms, and exclusions all disadvantage non-standard workers. The Note proposes reforms in each of these areas to combat this imbalance.

Designing a good unemployment insurance scheme is a delicate matter. In a system with no or little insurance, households may be subject to a high income risk, whereas excessively generous unemployment insurance systems are known to lead to high unemployment rates and are costly both from a fiscal perspective and for society as a whole. Andreas Pollak investigates what an optimal unemployment insurance system would look like, i.e. a system that constitutes the best possible compromise between income security and incentives to work. Using theoretical economic models and complex numerical simulations, he studies the effects of benefit levels and payment durations on unemployment and welfare. As the models allow for considerable heterogeneity of households, including a history-dependent labor productivity, it is possible to analyze how certain policies affect individuals in a specific age, wealth or skill group. The most important aspect of an unemployment insurance system turns out to be the benefits paid to the long-term unemployed. If this parameter is chosen too high, a large number of households may get caught in a long spell of unemployment with little chance of finding work again. Based on the predictions in these models, the so-called "Hartz IV" labor market reform recently adopted in Germany should have highly favorable effects on the unemployment rates and welfare in the long run.

This book provides an overview of the facts and issues of nonstandard employment in the countries where this labor market phenomenon has been most studied: the United States, Japan, and the European Union