During this NEUJOBS Lunchtime Session, Prof. Anton Hemerijck will present his brand new book “Changing welfare states”, to Social Affairs Commissioner László Andor, who will place it in the context of the forthcoming Social investment Package. “Changing Welfare States” is a major new examination of the wave of social reform that has swept across Europe over the past two decades. It carries out a comparative analysis of reform trajectories and political destinations in an era of rapid socioeconomic restructuring.

The ANCIEN FP7 project, which CEPS has coordinated since January 2009, is drawing to a close with a final conference to share the scientific and policy results with the different actors involved in social, health and long-term care (LTC) systems. This conference, held in Brussels on October 24th, aims to generate interactive discussions about better planning for LTC systems in Europe.

Launch of a timely new World Bank report addressing the key issues for European governments that struggle to manage the fiscal legacies of the global financial crisis, austerity and the spectre of rapid population ageing. At the same time, the circumstances that lead people to work and trade in the shadow economy have grown in importance. The World Bank study analyses these factors and formulates a set of general policy suggestions that are relevant for all EU member states, as well as those who aspire to join the Union to bring as much economic activity in from the shadow economy.

The aim of this study was to provide the Commission in view of the approaching end of the 2010 Lisbon agenda with an assessment of the employment challenges of the next decade. The study looked in particular at the policy challenges but also included governance challenges. An additional task was, however, to identify possible changes in the employment policy process; including guidelines and target, at the level of the EU.

Launched in January 2009, ANCIEN is a research project financed under the 7th EU Research Framework Programme. It runs for a 44-month period and involves 20 partners from EU member states. The project principally concerns the future of long-term care (LTC) for the elderly in Europe and addresses two questions in particular:
1) How will need, demand, supply and use of LTC develop?
2) How do different systems of LTC perform?

Mikkel Barslund holds a Ph.D. in economics from the University of Copenhagen and a M.Sc. in environmental economics from University College London. Prior to joining CEPS he worked as a senior economist at the Danish Economic Councils and as a Research Fellow at KU Leuven.

In the past decade the performance of service industries has come to the forefront of research on Europe's comparative economic performance, especially as the benefits from the use of information and communications technology (ICT) have been concentrated in these industries. The SERVICEGAP project will consider the academic and policy concerns that arise from the increasing importance of the market service sector.

ANCIEN is a research project financed under the 7th EU Research Framework Programme. The project includes 20 partners from EU member states, started in January 2009 and will last 44 months. 

The European Commission’s DG Employment and Social Affairs has contracted CEPS, together with the Personal Finance Research Centre (University of Bristol) and the European Savings Institute for a large-scale research project which aims to lay the basis for the future common operational European definition of over-indebtedness. Although over-commitment of consumers and financial exclusion are growing problems in Europe, there exists no standard definition of over-indebtedness.

In order to improve its capacity for surveying socio-economic developments in the European Union the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Employment, Social Affairs and Gender Parity has established a Social Situation Observatory composed of thematic research entities with the task of undertaking independent analysis of the social situation in Europe. The Observatory is coordinated by the Commission.

The project’s aim is to develop a new approach and new methods for assessing the performance and adequacy of the pension systems with full respect of the sustainability constraint. The project should provide a strengthened conceptual and scientific basis for assessing the capacity of European pension systems to deliver adequate old age income maintenance in a context of low fertility and steadily increasing life expectancy.