Policy programmes only for a few? Participation in labour market programmes among Swedish disabled workers

In a large sample of Swedish unemployed disabled workers, the workers participate in between zero and ten policy programmes during their unemployment spell. Clustering of programmes to about half of the sample is prominent. The number of programmes is modelled as a standard count data model, as a zero-inflated model and as a hurdle model. The most important question is whether disadvantaged workers are more or less probable to participate in programmes. The empirical analysis shows that participants in programmes have a stronger labour market attachment, than do non-participants. The number of programmes differ across subgroups of the disabled, and workers with impaired hearing or vision and psychical disabilities are expected to participate in more programmes than other groups. The supply of policy programmes is also of importance. In particular, for individuals living in municipalities with many disabled unemployed, the expected number of programmes is lower. Descriptive inspection of how the unemployment spells end, shows that non-participants, i.e. workers with zero programmes, withdraw from the labour force to a larger extent than do programme participants.