The health status of the unemployed in German unemployment statistics

Abstract

"The health status of unemployed people is much worse than that of people with jobs. More detailed information on the health of unemployed people at Bundesanstalt für Arbeit (BA), the German federal employment service, comes primarily from three data sources: First, placement counsellors enter health problems in computer-assisted position wanted listings. They are based on information provided by the unemployed person, the degree of disability recognised by the pension offices, and the results of the medical report procedure. Approx. one million unemployed people are registered as having health problems. The second source of information comes from the conclusions of medical reports by the employment office medical service, whose diagnoses of diseases and function are published in aggregate form. Over 300,000 medical reports were prepared for the unemployed in 2001 alone. Analyses show that the most frequent diagnoses in the medical report procedure of BA's medical service were 'diseases of the musculoskeletal system and connective tissue' followed by 'mental and behavioural disorders'. Certain occupational groups are affected disproportionately. The third source - as a result of the legal provisions governing the payment of benefits and the way the statistics are designed - is information on the occurrence of cases of unfitness for work among the unemployed. The outflow statistics record over 1.2 million cases of unfitness for work in 2002. That is an annual average of over 84,000 unemployed people who received unemployment benefits or assistance. However, unemployment statistics systematically underestimate the percentage of unemployed people with health problems due to the recording of the outflow of people who are unfit for work due to ill health. As shown by a representative IAB survey, unemployed people with health problems have poorer chances of reintegration into the labour market. Health problems are a major barrier to seeking a new job. It is urgent to develop approaches to prevention and health promotion that will support integration into the labour market." (Author's abstract, IAB-Doku) ((en))

Cite article

Hollederer, A. (2003): The health status of the unemployed in German unemployment statistics. In: IAB Labour Market Research Topics No. 54, p. 1-31.