percentage-point increase in probability). There also seems to be some stigma associated with longer spells, which could potentially hurt recipients since they spend more time unemployed on average, but this effect is very small compared to the unemployment insurance one (a one percentage-point decrease in probability for every tow extra months).

98. As we did when analyzing unemployment duration, we want to differentiate between 'currently receiving unemployment insurance' and 'having ever received unemployment insurance' to allow for potential behavioral differences related to changes in the recipiency regime. Once we do so, we find that the probability of exit-to-employment for recipients is actually very low while receiving unemployment insurance, and that it increases substantially once the benefits are over. In particular, workers who are currently receiving unemployment insurance are 40 percent less likely than non-recipients to move to a private sector job, while those who have exhausted their benefits are 35 percent more likely to do so. Similarly, when we distinguish between high and low replacement unemployment insurance, it appears that the probability of finding a job in the private-sector is smallest while the worker is receiving the former. In sum, workers who are receiving benefits are the least likely to exit-toemployment, and workers whose benefits have ended are the most likely to do so.

99. The negative effect of unemployment duration remains in both models, but it is still very small, about a one percentage-point decrease per month of unemployment. Given that, on average, recipients spend 2extra months unemployed, compared to non-recipients, the effect of duration is far from compensating the effect of recipiency (of exhaustion of recipiency, to be more precise).

100. When we repeat this exercise using the Labor Force Survey, we obtain results that are qualitative similar but insignificant in most cases (Table 4 in Data Appendix). The effects of both unemployment insurance and social assistance/support present the signs discussed above, but they are too small to be significantly different from zero. Only the negative effect of unemployment duration is robust to the data change, together with those effects associated with education and the lack of previous employment experience. It is, however, not surprising that the evidence from the Labor Force Survey is weak. Given the design of the survey and our sampling strategy, individuals are observed for short periods of time at the beginning of their spells, which implies that most unemployment spells are censored. Hence, a substantial fraction of those that appear in the sample as 'not having found a job', should be viewed as 'not having found a job yet' instead, since they will probably do so in the future. For this reason, we find the Unemployment Registry results, based on completed spells, more reliable and therefore continue with the analysis under the assumption that benefit recipients seem to find private employment more often than non-recipients.

# **Job search and job/match quality**

101. In principle, there is no single explanation for the link between unemployment insurance recipiency and a higher likelihood of exit-to-employment. One can think of the probability of exit-to-employment as a function of the number of job offers that a worker receives, which in time depends on the individual's search effort, and his willingness to accept any given offer. Then, it may be the case that unemployment insurance payments, by lowering the opportunity cost of unemployment, allow these workers to search more (and 27