Prof. Dr. Debra Hevenstone

Research: comparative social policy, social insurance design, financing of social services, integration programs

Teaching: Data in practice, comparative social policy

Data and social services

Welfare state design

BA, MA, continuing education

Comparative Social Policy, Poverty, Economics, Management, Simulation (external)

Social service financing/contracts

Social insurance design

Gender & the labor market

Active labor market programs

Digitalization & data for practice

New Public Policy Financing Models, Innovative or Ineffective?“ (Swiss Network for International Studies, 2019-2021) A “social impact bond,” is a way to finance social programs through private investors who can make profits or losses, depending on program outcomes or impacts. SIBs have expanded, in part, based on the argument that they improve services. We are conducting the first empirical study (six providers in four countries) to test whether SIB financing has an impact on the implementation and outcomes for active labor market programs.

Family Models and Unemployment: How Intra-Household Economics Moderate the Effects of Unemployment Insurance Design (Swiss National Science Foundation, 2018-2022) Household have slowly shifted from the typical family with a single breadwinner to more diverse forms included two-earner households, single parent households, and singles. At the same time, social insurance has maintained its design without considering how shifts in intra-household economics might change incentives. We examine how maximum benefit durations might have a differing impact on; 1. duration of unemployment, 2. health, and 3. divorce, depending on intrahousehold economics. We take advantage of natural experiments like policy changes and rule discontinuities, using causal inference methods.

Reducing Work After Childbirth: A causal estimate of long-run lost income (PI with Ana Fernandes, SNF, 2020-2021) The contribution of part-time work to the motherhood gap is not well-understood, an important gap given that policies incentivizing female labor force participation assume that increasing participation will reduce the motherhood gap. In this project we examine how work choices (current and cumulative effects of part-time work and work pauses) contribute to women’s lifetime income gaps following first childbirth. We use Swiss administrative data from 1988 to 2016 and a quasi-experimental strategy to describe the motherhood gap in income and work choices, consider differences by language region, cohort, and occupation, assess the extent to which the gap is attributable to work choices.

Hack4SocialGood (lead Oliver Hümbelin). An event for the Social Services with a research article examining how to manage inclusion in hackathon events.

Age-NT National Innovation Network Aging in Society (under Peter Neuenschwander). An investigation into whether occupational pension contributions impact unemployment duration and reemployment wages.

Kessler, Dorian; Hevenstone, Debra; Vandecasteele, Leen; Sepahniya, Samin (2022). Weathering the storm together: Does unemployment insurance help couples avoid divorce? Journal of European Social Policy, 095892872211413. Sage Publications 10.1177/09589287221141363 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/09589287221141363>

Kessler, Dorian; Hevenstone, Debra (2022). The impact of unemployment benefits on birth outcomes: Quasi-experimental evidence from European linked register data PLOS ONE, 17(3), pp. 1-13. Public Library of Science 10.1371/journal.pone.0264544 <http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0264544>

Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management

European Network for Social Policy Analysis