Reinvigorating the social contract and strengthening social cohesion: Social protection responses to COVID-19

The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed the vulnerability of those who are inadequately covered by social protection in more and less developed countries alike, and has exacerbated the fragility of a social contract that was already under strain in many countries. A weak social contract in the context of an exceptional crisis poses a very real risk to social cohesion. Nevertheless, many States have reasserted themselves as the guarantor of rights by protecting public health and incomes. By sustaining these measures, economic recovery will be supported which will help minimize risks that may weaken social cohesion. However, this is a fast-moving, inherently unstable and protracted crisis. Social protection stands at a critical juncture. Decisive policy action will be required to strengthen social protection systems, including floors, as one of the cornerstones of a reinvigorated social contract.     

Optimal stabilization policies for housing activity

The usual approach in econometric modeling is to assume that the behavior of government agencies is exogenous. In this paper we have suggested that the policies of government agencies are not truly exogenous and should be studied in relation to the specific objectives pursued by these agencies.Within this framework, we investigated the implications of optimizing the behavior of two U.S. government agencies, Federal Home Loan Bank (FHLB) and Federal National Mortgage Association (FNMA), involved in the housing market. The technique we have utilized is dynamic programming.Based on the assumption that there agencies attempt to stabilize the housing market we have calculated the values for the optimal strategies in the past years and compared them with the historical patterns they have actually followed. Our interpretation of the behavior of these agencies is as follows: FHLB has a significant potential for housing stabilization. However, it has historically put more emphasis on keeping a uniform policy than stabilizing the housing activity. In this way, the role it has played in the housing market may be more destabilizing than stabilizing. On the other hand, FNMA's activity has had a rather uncertain effect on the housing stabilization. The conservative policies that FNMA has followed in the past are consistent with the uncertainties implicit in decision making but, at the same time, can be blamed for failing to create sufficient information regarding their effectiveness on the housing stabilization.     

Does Paid Work Enhance Women's Access to Welfare? Evidence from Selected Industrializing Countries

Citizenship has become increasingly associated—both symbolicallyand programmatically—with a person's capacity to performpaid work. For feminists this raises a key question: can women'sparticipation in paid work become the basis for their inclusionin welfare settlements? The question is examined here by exploringthe extent to which women's absorption into export-orientedmanufacturing industries has created the conditions for theirsocial citizenship in three industrializing countries (SouthKorea, China, and Mexico). The social rights considered arelimited to pensions and health care.