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The digital revolution has brought about both positive expectations and negative concerns. Many experts predict that the current technological revolution, so-called "Fourth Industrial Revolution", which is expected to increase productivity in a disruptive way, has significant implications on employment and the labor market. In subsequence, the possible demise of the traditional employment system could markedly undermine the comtemporary welfare state. As a result, basic income has emerged as an alternative. However, little welfare state research has conducted the systematic review on the impact of the present technological revolution on employment and welfare states. In this paper, we will start to review the gist of the digital revolution and critically review recent studies on its effects on employment and welfare states together with actual case studies. In particular, we will investigate the experiences of platform economies of Uber and Amazon Mechanical Turk, and the German experience from 'Work 4.0'. Finally, we will discuss key issues of future welfare state reforms. This research argues that the effects of the technological revolution on employment and welfare state policies would be enormous, but they will be most likely to be mediated by domestic political and policy institutions. It emphasizes the importance of high-quality social investment that would enable individuals to flexibly adapt technological changes and support creative human capital resource. But, high-quality social investment could not be sustained without the decent social protection system that universally provides security to people.

After critically assessing the effectiveness of basic income as an alternative to the existing social security system, this article argues that basic income is fundamentally incapable of providing an adequate protection for those in social risks or welfare needs. The proponents of basic income often claims that technological innovations will lead to the end of work and thus that basic income will be required for all citizens in the future. Moreover, they emphasize that labor market flexibility is making a large segment of work forces unstable working poor, what is often called the precariat who are not effectively protected by the existing social insurance programs. For them, basic income is the best source of social protection for the precariat of today and the citizens in the future, freeing them from the necessity of having a paid work. This article, however, points out the ineffectiveness of basic income as social protection due to its unustainably high cost that comes from unconditional benefit provisions regardless of levels of income, social risks, and welfare needs. Also it challenges the simplified ‘Luddites’ image of workless society in the future, arguning that techological unemployment can be overcome by new job creation as seen in Silicon Valley and job sharing following working time reduction. It maintains that it is more cost-effective and reliable to strengthen the welfare state based on the principle of reciprocity that aims at ‘universal sufficient protection for those in social risks and welfare needs.’

Globalization, deindustrialization, and the revolutionary development of technology has led to the concerns that existing social policies might not be fit for the current and upcoming society. At the same time, the idea of universal basic income has drawn significant attentions as the alternative to the old welfare state. There are pros and cons of basic income, and scholars of both sides stand against each other with their equivalently strong logics. In this situation, some governments have planned or conducted field experiments in order to estimate the causal effects of basic income. This study explores the Finnish and Dutch basic income experiments in methodological perspective. All the World have been watching the experiments in these two countries with keen interest. The results of these experiments will surely influence on the pros and cons of basic income in numerous countries, including South Korea. It is important to precisely figure out the methodological meanings and limitations of the experiments, for the experiments in both countries deal with only some partial components of basic income and have been exposed to many threats to internal validity. Therefore, scholars for and against basic income should be careful in interpreting the findings from these experiments. This study elucidate the methodological meanings and limitations of the Finnish and Dutch basic income experiments. Furthermore, this study extracts some lessons from these experiments that would be useful if scholars would have an opportunity to design and conduct a basic income experiment in South Korea.

Purpose: This study empirically investigates the utilization and expenditure of health care and long-term care at the last year of life for long-term care beneficiaries in Korea. Methods: This study used National Health Insurance and Long-term Care Insurance claims data of 271,474 LTCI beneficiaries, who died from July 2008 to December 2012. Their cause of death, place of death, health care costs, and the provision of aggressive care were analyzed. Results: Cardio-vascular disease(29.8%) and cancer(15.3%) were reported as their major cause of death, and hospital(64.4%), home(22.0%), social care facility(9.2%) were analyzed as the place of death. 99.3% of subjects used both health care and long-term care during the last 1 year of life. The average survival period were 516.2 days after they were LTCI beneficiaries. The health care expenditure gradually increased near the death, and the last month were three times more rather than the first month. Furthermore, 31.8% experienced some aggressive cares(CPR, blood transfusion, hemo-dialysis, etc.) at the last month of life. Conclusion: The results of this study suggest that it is important to develop the end of life care policies(for example, hospice, advanced care directives) for the LTCI beneficiaries. They might contribute to the improvement of quality of life and the reduction of health care expenditure of the elderly at the end-of-life.

The purpose of this study is to analyze the factors affecting service use intention of long-term care among the disabled. This study conducts a longitudinal study using the modified Andersen model by the disabled age groups of the 50-64 group and the 65 over group. This study examined random effects panel logit analysis for the 50-64 group and the 65 over group by age variations. The results have shown that there are different factors Influencing factors for each specific age group of the disabled(50-64, 65 over). The results were as follows: there are differences of factors between the 50-64 group and the 65 over group. This study found that predisposing factors of the service use intention of long-term care were significantly related to age, residential area, education status, existence of spouses. Enabling factors of the service use intention of long-term care were significantly related to long-term care service recognition, saving, personal salary income level, housing status. Need factors of the service use intention of long-term care were significantly related to chronic diseases, psychological health, IADL. So, there are a need for a policy considerations such as service for the mid-old age disabled by age groups. Finally, implications and future research directions were discussed based on the finding of the study.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the factors that interrupt the use of social security of elderly North Korean refugees. As a result of qualitative content analysis using interview data, it is found that the elderly North Korean defectors have a lower access to the social security system. The main reason for hindering the use of social security system is low awareness due to limited information channels, psychological distance to South Korean society and residents. Moreover, this psychological distance is a factor that reduces the geographical accessibility of elderly North Korean defectors by preferring to use services in specific institutions for North Korean, while South Korean elderly people can use the service elsewhere. In addition, there are many cases in which the elderly in North Korean defectors do not receive sufficient social security due to low income. On the other hand, social security systems with high accessibility of older North Korean refugees are characterized by the fact that they are provided by experts who have formed sufficient rapport with North Korean refugees. Therefore, it seems possible to improve the accessibility of elderly defectors' friendly system by professional workers with cultural competence. In addition, a multidimensional approach is needed to fully cope with the complex desires of elderly North Korean defectors and a mechanism should be set up to reflect their opinion in system operation.

This study has examined how the welfare system has changed as it has passed through the most controversial period in Korean modern history. The welfare system has changed in a way that adapts to the need for export-led economic growth. Industrialization centered on light industry, which started in the mid-1960s, absorbed the labor force that existed in the rural areas and commodified them, thereby creating a momentum for Korean society to get out of poverty. However, the public de-commodification, ie social security system, adapted to the commodification of the labor force has been institutionalized only in a very limited area and people. Indeed, the de-commodification system was confined to the area directly linked to the reproduction of the labor force. Even so, the target was very limited in the abundance of labor in rural areas. Compulsory medical insurance was rejected because of corporate burden, and industrial accidents insurance was introduced centering on large-scale workplaces. As the Korean economy began to move from the light industry to the heavy industry in the 1970s, the commodificated labor force changed from a low skilled labor force to a skilled male labor force. It is at this time that dual structures have begun to be created between workers employed in export-oriented large enterprises and workers employed in domestic-oriented SMEs. Therefore, the system of de-commodification that supports the reproduction of labor power in response to social risks has also been institutionalized centering on large-scale workplaces.

Japan has generally been considered as the developmentalist welfare state. However, Japan has recently been transformed into a social investment state. Although it still has a developmentalist characteristics with its institutional path dependence, the new social and economic challenges derived from the new social risks such as low birth rates and aging population forced Japan to adopt a new welfare state strategy. The paradigm shift in terms of welfare state strategy was launched by the Third Way positioning of the Democratic party government and succeed to the Second Stage of Abenomics under the Third Abe Cabinet. This paper argues that the welfare state paradigm shift towards a social investment state in Japan is not limited to the Japan’s Plan for Dynamic Engagement of All Citizens for a virtuous cycle of growth and distribution, but expands its scope to include the work-family balance policies such as labor market activation for women and public caring for children.

The purpose of this study is to examine which factors decide welfare exit in the hope building account program that targets low-income families. This study used the matched DB of hope ribbon program and hope building account program which is collected by central self-sufficiency foundation. As a result, the significant factors in welfare exit are main income, health(illness), licensed possession of status, education, marital status, employment and entrepreneurship, in-kind support, professional case management service, and social service. In particular, the participants who received proper social services and case management services in the program have more possibility of welfare exit than the participants who did not. It have implications in that the study found the success factors by connecting hope ribbon program and the hope building account program which has been introduced since 2010 and enlarge the scope of the performance analysis of the hope building account program. In addition, this study provides the suggestions to improve anty-poverty policy and system in the direction of providing work incentives and facilitating welfare exit and securing continuity of the hope building account program and the hope ribbon program. Specifically, this paper can be utilized as objective data in establishing a expansion of the hope building account program and suggesting the important issue for the case management in the filed.

This study aimed to analyze the characteristics and problems of the quasi-market for welfare technology in the long-term care service area in South Korea. The qualitative interviews to the developers of welfare technology were conducted. The main results are as follows. First, the long-term care insurance (LTC) in South Korea has helped to create the limited amount of the effective demands for welfare equipments with low technology. Second, the systemic features of the LTC, however, have constraint the quantitative expansion as well as qualitative growth of the quasi-market for welfare technology. The low level of financial support combined with strict regulations has obstructed qualitative competition in the market. Third, they tend to develop the standardized and minimum welfare equipments for the serious needy for long-term care instead of welfare technology promoting independency of the elderly. Based on the results, this study provided the predictions for the growth of welfare technology and suggested some policy implications.

This paper aims to apply the convergence theory into the minimum income guarantee which forms the moral foundation of the welfare state. The research question of this paper is if the level of minimum income guarantee among EU member states (EU-15) gradually converging into a certain level. For this purpose, Chapter 2 describes the convergence and diversion of welfare states since the Second World War, and chapter 3 explains the historical development of the EU social policies since the Rome Treaty (1957). Chapter 4, which is the main body of this paper, analyzes if the level of minimum income guarantees of EU member states is converging by the coefficient of variation analysis and regression analysis. However, converging trend of the level of basic income guarantee among EU member states has not been proved. In other words, social policy arena still remains strongly in the realm of national sovereign states, irrespective of growing pressure from the supra-national governing body like the EU. It is in line with the Abram de Swaan’s argument that “welfare states is nation states” (1994: 110).

This study examines labour market and unemployment protection policies as a configuration in 12 OECD countries in order to investigate how countries from different regime conform to or diverse from previous welfare state regime discussion, and to examine its relationship with poverty and inequality. In analyzing the combination of the unemployment insurance, the unemployment assistance, and active labour market policy, firstly, fuzzy scores of unemployment insurance was calculated by analyzing the strictness of eligibility, duration of benefit and the generosity of income replacement rate. For unemployment assistance, the ratio of public assistance expenditure to the GDP in each country and the ratio of unemployment benefit level to the average wage in each country have been considered. As for the active labour market policy, the total expenditure per GDP of this policy was converted into fuzzy points and analyzed. As a result, 5 types in 2005 and 6 types in 2010 were generated. Specifically, 'assistance type(iAp)', ‘insurance type (Iap)', 'comprehensive safety net type (IAP)', 'weak safety net type(iap)' were analyzed. This paper suggested policy implication for South Korean case, which consistently had high score for weak safety net type(iap).