Tuesday, November 16, 2010
[IWS] ILO: WORLD SOCIAL SECURITY REPORT 2010/11: PROVIDING COVERAGE IN TIMES OF CRISIS AND BEYOND [16 November 2010]
IWS Documented News Service
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Institute for Workplace Studies----------------- Professor Samuel B. Bacharach
School of Industrial & Labor Relations-------- Director, Institute for Workplace Studies
Cornell University
16 East 34th Street, 4th floor---------------------- Stuart Basefsky
New York, NY 10016 -------------------------------Director, IWS News Bureau
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International Labour Organization (ILO)
World Social Security Report 2010/11: Providing coverage in times of crisis and beyond [16 November 2010]
[full-text, 299 pages]
or
http://digitalcommons.ilr.cornell.edu/intl/95
Executive Summary
http://www.socialsecurityextension.org/gimi/gess/RessFileDownload.do?ressourceId=19201
Graphs & Figures
http://www.socialsecurityextension.org/gimi/gess/ShowWiki.do?wid=76
Statistical Annex
http://www.socialsecurityextension.org/gimi/gess/ShowWiki.do?wid=95
Press Release 16 November 2010
Social security plays critical role in times of crisis, but still eludes much of the world
[excerpt]
The World Social Security Report 2010/11 is the first in a series of reports on social security
coverage in different parts of the world. It examines the scope, extent, levels and quality of
coverage by various social security branches and the scale of countries’ investments in social
security, measured by the size and structure of social security expenditure and the sources of
its fi nancing. The thematic focus of this fi rst report is the nature of social security responses
to the financial and economic crisis.
Among its main findings:
§ Taking into account those who are not economically active, it is estimated that only about 20 per cent of the world’s working age population and their families have effective access to comprehensive social protection systems.
§ On average, 17.2 per cent of global GDP is allocated to social security. However, these expenditures are concentrated in higher-income countries.
§ Worldwide, nearly 40 per cent of the population of working age is legally covered by contributory old-age pension schemes. In North America and Europe, this number is nearly double, while in Africa less than one-third of the working-age population is covered even by legislation. Effective coverage is significantly lower than legal coverage. In sub-Saharan Africa, only 5 per cent of the working-age population is effectively covered by contributory programmes, while this share is about 20 per cent in Asia, the Middle East and North Africa.
§ In high income countries, 75 per cent of people aged 65 or over are receiving some kind of pension while in low-income countries less than 20 per cent of the elderly receive pension benefits.
§ Statutory unemployment social security schemes exist only in 42 per cent of the 184 countries covered by the report, often covering only a minority of their labour force.
§ In the OECD countries, private financial sources constitute on average one fifth of retirement incomes but they are over 40 per cent in five countries: Australia, Canada, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom and the United States. On the other end, there are less than 5 per cent in Austria, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia.
§ Less than 30 per cent of the global working-age population is legally covered by insurance for workplace accident and employment-related diseases. However, there are large regional differences in legal coverage.
§ In low income countries, no more than 35 per cent of women in rural areas have access to professional health services, while in urban areas the access rate rise to about 70 per cent. However, this is still more than 20 percentage points lower than the access in high-income countries.
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Stuart Basefsky
Director, IWS News Bureau
Institute for Workplace Studies
Cornell/ILR School
16 E. 34th Street, 4th Floor
New York, NY 10016
Telephone: (607) 255-2703
Fax: (607) 255-9641
E-mail: smb6@cornell.edu
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