We are happy to announce our first online peer learning session of 2026. The event was hosted by the team behind the WellSIre (Wellbeing Returns on Social Investment Recalibration) project.
How can welfare states navigate successfully the complexities of the knowledge economies and the challenges of ageing societies, while investing effectively and fairly the large portion of taxes and other public funds they allocate to welfare provision?
The WellSIRe project aspires to produce a comprehensive and robust empirical analysis of the social investment paradigm on its own terms. Using the analytical grid of ‘stock’, ‘flow’ and ‘buffer’ policies in institutional complementarity, it puts the social investment perspective, as a distinct welfare paradigm, to the test of macro- and micro-level wellbeing returns in post-industrial European welfare states. The project covers five main themes:
1. Societal well-being – SI policy effect on welfare performance at a societal level
2. Individual well-being across the life-course – SI policy effect on life-course transitions with respect to education, employment and poverty at an individual level
3. Subjectively perceived wellbeing – SI policy effect on subjective wellbeing and people’s capabilities to fulfil their aspirations with respect to education, family formation, work–life balance, and job satisfaction
4. National SI reform and EU agenda-setting – Sequences of SI policy reforms and recalibration processes at a national level across EU member states with a focus on policy coherence and outcomes
5. Sub-national SI delivery – Subnational differences between SI service delivery, with a focus on multi-level governance and policy complementarities.
The session examined the returns to social investment-oriented welfare provision in the EU. Using a life-course perspective and macro-level comparative evidence from EU Member States, it showed that welfare systems combining capacitating services with inclusive income protection were associated with stronger employment performance, higher productivity, and longer working lives. These outcomes also supported lower poverty rates and more sustainable public finances. The analysis challenged the view that generous welfare provision undermined competitiveness or fiscal sustainability. Instead, we found that social investment and social protection were mutually reinforcing: countries that invested consistently in policy packages combining childcare, education and training, active labour market policies, and active ageing sustained robust revenue bases and, by implication, inclusive wellbeing outcomes. We concluded on the methodological implications of studying the returns to social investment in Europe’s ageing knowledge economies.
You can find the agenda, presentations and a short summary as attachments to this page.
The webinar recording can be viewed here.
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