The Stabilising Effect of Social Policies in the Financial Crisis

Social policy measures and the social security systems in the EU stabilised GDP and employment noticeably during the recent financial and economic crisis. In terms of their size automatic stabilisers were particularly important. Discretionary social policy measures aiming at the stabilisation of the economy had positive but modest effects. The welfare state's stabilising influence on expectations, though difficult to quantify, is also assumed to have played an important role.