Economic Strain in Post-Communist Countries and the Rest of Europe: Attitudes Towards the Unemployed and the Old

0565941 - SOÚ 2024 RIV US eng J - Journal Article
Bašná, Kristýna
Economic Strain in Post-Communist Countries and the Rest of Europe: Attitudes Towards the Unemployed and the Old.
East European Politics and Societies. Roč. 37, č. 3 (2023), s. 1110-1129. ISSN 0888-3254. E-ISSN 1533-8371
R&D Projects: GA MŠMT LTT20011; GA MŠMT LM2018139
Institutional support: RVO:68378025
Keywords : unemployed * old * welfare * post-communist
OECD category: Sociology
Impact factor: 0.7, year: 2022
Method of publishing: Limited access
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/08883254221131595

This paper investigates attitudes towards the welfare state measured as government responsibility towards the standard of living of the unemployed and the old. The article focuses on the differences between post-communist countries and the rest of Europe, contextualised using the self-interest theory, specifically economic strain. Data on thirty one European countries gleaned from the European Social Survey collected in 2008 and 2016 are analysed using multilevel methods. The findings show that even though citizens in post-communist countries are purportedly more in favour of government intervention in regard to the welfare state, perceptible differences emerge based on individual characteristics, namely economic strain, combined with whether the respondent lives in a post-communist country. The cross-national differences in welfare support between post-communist countries and the rest of Europe are largely driven by differences in economic strain, with citizens in post-communist countries that struggle financially exhibiting higher support for welfare state provisions in comparison to their peers in countries without a communist legacy.
Permanent Link: https://hdl.handle.net/11104/0337416