Sweden Finland Austria

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Elements of Social Security
A comparison covering: Denmark
Sweden
Finland
Austria
Germany
The Netherlands
Great Britain
Canada
Hans Hansen
The Danish National Institute of Social Research
99:14

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Elements of Social Security
Research Director: Niels Ploug, Centre for Welfare State Research.
Lillian Eckardt has prepared the manuscript.
Contact group:
Ingemar Eriksson, Swedish Ministry of Finance; Lars Erik Lindholm, Swedish Ministry of
Finance; Heikki Viitamäki, Vatt, Finland; Ursula Obermayr, Austrian Ministry of Labour, Health
and Social Affairs; Ulrich van Essen, German Ministry of Finance; Marcel Einerhand, Dutch
Ministry of Social Affairs and Employment; John Ball, Department of Social Security, UK;
Graham Parker, Inland Revenue, UK; Gary Bagley, Human Resources Development, Canada.
Printed by Holbæk Center-Tryk A/S
Printing: 500
Cover photo: Susanne Mertz/Billedhuset
This essay may be cited freely with clear statement of source
ISSN 1396-1810
ISBN 87-7487-623-6
For further information, please contact:
Centre for Welfare State Research
The Danish National Institute of Social Research
Herluf Trolles Gade 11
DK-1052 Copenhagen K
Denmark
Phone: [phone]
Fax:
[phone]
E-mail: [e-mail]
www.sfi.dk

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PREFACE
Elements of Social Security is a comparative study of important elements of the social
security systems in Denmark (DK), Sweden (S), Finland (FIN), Austria (A), Germany (D),
the Netherlands (NL), Great Britain (GB) and Canada (CAN). It should be emphasized that
Germany is the former West Germany (Alte Länder).
This is the 7th edition of the publication, covering income levels and rules for social
security and personal taxation for 1997. Basis for the projections to 1997 income levels is
the 1996 data (in some cases 1997 data) for OECD's The Tax/Benefit Position of Em-
ployees as reported by national experts. Editions 1-4 of Elements of Social Security were
published as working papers from the Danish Ministry of Economic Affairs, edition 5 as
publication no. 97:8 and edition 6 as publication no. 98:4, from the Danish National
Institute of Social Research.
The calculations have always been based upon projected data, which in case of inaccurate
projections may lead to incorrect results. In this edition calculations based upon ’correct’
historical data, i.e. data published in The Tax/Benefit Position of Production Workers,
since 1996 The Tax/Benefit Position of Employees from OECD, are included for Sweden
covering the period 1991-1996. The differences between calculations based upon ’pro-
jected’ and ’correct’ data are relatively small, cf. chapter 3, section 3.1. The series of
calculations for Sweden also contain the impact of the considerable changes in the Swedish
tax/benefit system in that period, cf. chapter 3, section 3.2. A similar study for Finland is
contained in chapter 4.
The sequence of the countries in the tables has been changed, it is now DK, S, FIN, A, D,
NL, GB and CAN. The Scandinavian countries are together, the new entrants to EU, FIN,
S and A are together, the central European countries A, D and NL are together and GB is
together with the European countries and Canada. The country 
blocks' also follow the
broad categories in the welfare state theory, the Scandinavian model, the continental
European model and the Anglo Saxon model.
A few errors were found in the previous editions, this time for Great Britain. The income
related component of the Statutory Maternity Pay should have been levied with national
insurance contributions, it was not. The impact from receiving maternity benefits was a
little too small as a consequence of this error. Furthermore, the presentation of the basic
old age pension in Great Britain was misleading, this has now been corrected.
Copenhagen, August 1999
Hans Hansen

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