Activation Measures in Social Security: Lessons from the Dutch Case

Dutch social security has undergone important changes since the 1990s, in that the focus shifted from predominantly compensating the loss of income into giving incentives for claimants and benefits recipients to stay in or get back to work. While still providing a relatively high level of benefit if there is no chance to work (to the full extent), the legislature has been quite creative in adopting conditions that stimulate persons to do their best to be in work. For this purpose, this is interesting for an American audience, since the USA system is far less generous out of fear that persons will not do enough to take care of themselves, while also leaving those who cannot earn a sufficient income alone. A combination of activating conditions and a good safety net is, therefore, an interesting alternative.