A job search assistance intervention designed for newly arrived immigrants - Evidence from a Swedish Randomized Evaluation

Last registered on October 30, 2020
View Trial History

Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
A job search assistance intervention designed for newly arrived immigrants - Evidence from a Swedish Randomized Evaluation
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0006686
Initial registration date
October 29, 2020

Initial registration date is when the trial was registered.

It corresponds to when the registration was submitted to the Registry to be reviewed for publication.

First published
October 30, 2020, 9:28 AM EDT

First published corresponds to when the trial was first made public on the Registry after being reviewed.

Locations

Country
Sweden
Region

Primary Investigator

Name
Peter Skogman Thoursie
Affiliation
Stockholm University
Contact Primary Investigator

Other Primary Investigator(s)

Additional Trial Information

Status
On going
Start date
2020-03-01
End date
2021-04-30
Keywords
Labor
Additional Keywords
JEL code(s)
Secondary IDs
Abstract
The purpose with this project is to evaluate if a job-matching intervention, based on formal as well as informal skills, can improve labour market opportunities for new arrivals in Sweden. The control intervention consists of regular services provided by the Swedish Employment Service (PES) which is more oriented towards preparatory courses and providing basic education, and when matching occurs, it primarily considers job seekers’ formal skills. Job search assistance (JSA) has been found to be an efficient tool to reduce unemployment (Card et al., 2010, 2017). Recent evidence suggest that job-matching and vacancy referrals are important mechanisms behind the effect (Cheung et al., 2019). However, matching is normally based on formal competences and therefore not available for job-seekers lacking education and relevant labour market experience. Such job-seekers are often classified as non-matchable and assigned to preparatory programs for which there are no evidence of increasing transition to employment.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Skogman Thoursie, Peter. 2020. "A job search assistance intervention designed for newly arrived immigrants - Evidence from a Swedish Randomized Evaluation." AEA RCT Registry. October 30. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.6686-1.0
Sponsors & Partners
Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
The intervention studied in this project is a Job search assistance (JSA) intervention designed to offer job search and matching assistance to job seekers who have been in Sweden only for a short period of time and where some seekers lack education and relevant job experience. The intervention is therefore designed to include both formal as well as informal competences in the matching process. The program starts with a broad mapping of the job seekers’ formal and informal skills, desired professions and their requests for working hours. The match is then supposed to take place by surveying potential employers based on the characteristics identified among the job seekers. The match between the job seeker and the potential employer is then supported by PES throughout the process of the job-seeker’s entry into the labour market, both during the interview, and with follow-ups when needed.
Intervention Start Date
2020-03-01
Intervention End Date
2021-04-30

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
a. Non-subsidized and subsidized regular work
b. Regular education (education that is not part of the by interventions operated by the Swedish employment office)
c. How fast participants go to regular work (days until a regular work is obtained)
d. Quality of the work measured by the monthly full-time wage received
e. Intermediate and long-term labour market outcomes such as annual and monthly labour earnings, monthly full-time equivalent wages, hiring- and separations, occupational and industry affiliation
Primary Outcomes (explanation)

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
The target group are newly arrived immigrants in need of protection (as refugee, subsidiary protection, and including their family members), who have had residence permit up to four years. All job seekers from the target group are included in the target population and explicitly made eligible for selection to the study. The project is constructed as a randomized controlled trial (RCT) which enables us to evaluate the effects of the program. Hence, study participants are randomized into either the JSA program or the control group. Study participation is conditional on informed consent about the general purpose of the study.

Until randomization, all participants only receive general information where specific information on each intervention is not mentioned. In the next step, those randomized into the treatment group receive information on the availability of the JSA program. Job seekers randomized into the control group continue the meeting with the caseworker and continue to have access to all services at the PES that would have been available to them outside of the study.
Experimental Design Details
Randomization Method
Randomization done in office by a random generator
Randomization Unit
Individual level randomization within clusters consisting of combinations of 16 geographical locations at the PES, gender and months during the period March 2019 to April 2021. This, in total 832 clusters (2×26×16)
Was the treatment clustered?
Yes

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
832 clusters. A cluster is a locations-gender-months combination.
Sample size: planned number of observations
6,500-9,000 individuals
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
832 clusters. A cluster is a locations-gender-months combination.
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
Supporting Documents and Materials
IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
Swedish Ethical Review Authority
IRB Approval Date
2019-02-14
IRB Approval Number
N/A
Analysis Plan

Analysis Plan Documents

Analysis_Plan_29oct2020.pdf

MD5: 8c451269be1169b80d22f01e59311938

SHA1: 72dd715fdd925ff897b2bad67f3de4251a27b2f5

Uploaded At: October 29, 2020

Post-Trial

Post Trial Information

Study Withdrawal

There is information in this trial unavailable to the public. Use the button below to request access.

Request Information

Intervention

Is the intervention completed?
No
Data Collection Complete
Data Publication

Data Publication

Is public data available?
No

Program Files

Program Files
Reports, Papers & Other Materials

Relevant Paper(s)

Reports & Other Materials