The doctoral researcher Heiner Salomon from the project "Global Dynamics of Coverage and Generosity in Work-Injury Compensation, Unemployment and Old-Age Pensions" recently returned from Bangladesh.
From September 11 to October 20, 2023, he was traveling in the South Asian country to prepare a survey with recipients and non-recipients of the Old Age Allowance (OAA), a social pension together with a team of more than 40 people. The project's cooperation partners include the University of Dhaka, the CMI Bergen, and ARCED Foundation, which is a survey organization responsible for the collection of the data.
Due to the tensions before the upcoming elections in two months, however, the project could not overcome the bureaucratic hurdles. Therefore, Heiner and the team prepared and extensively tested the survey questionnaire with the ARCED team. The data collection has been moved to April next year.
The social pension provides for a payment of 600 Taka every month - equivalent to about 5 Euro - to older persons living in poverty. It was introduced back in 1998 at 100 Taka a month and has been expanding in transfer size and coverage rate ever since. Since 2021, nearly 5 million older persons receive the OAA.
With the survey, Heiner Salomon, his principal investigator Prof. Sebastian Fehrler and their colleagues would like to investigate the following questions in particular: What impact does the payment have on income/(food) consumption? Has the physical and mental health of the beneficiaries been improved by the payment? Does the payment of the social pension lead to an increase in the quality of life?
Heiner Salomon has a Master in Public Policy and has researched international social policy in multiple international research institutes, such as ODI in London. At the CRC 1342 he is predominantly interested in the effects of social transfers such as the OAA on income and preferences for redistribution in countries of the Global South.
Contact:
Heiner Salomon
CRC 1342: Global Dynamics of Social Policy
Mary-Somerville-Straße 5
28359 Bremen
Phone: +49 421 218-58649
E-Mail: heiner.salomon@uni-bremen.de
