Abstract

Active labor market programs (ALMPs) can help welfare recipients (re)integrate into the labor market and/or start an apprenticeship. However, job centers have been intermittently closed to the public amid the Covid-19 pandemic and the social distancing measures accompanying it. Clients could, for several months, not physically attend meetings with caseworkers and be counseled face-to-face. Private ALMP providers, such as those responsible for supporting welfare recipients in their job search or educational progress, were also affected unprepared by social distancing measures, having to close their doors to clients. Therefore, clients have barely had the possibility to participate in ALMPs since the pandemic started. This project investigates how entries to ALMPs have developed during the Covid-19 pandemic. Our analysis differentiates entries according to types of ALMPs and welfare recipients’ characteristics such as gender, age, and migration background. We descriptively compare these developments until August 2020 with ALMP participation in past years using data from the Statistics Department of the Federal Labor Agency.