New book on unemployment and social exclusion

Johan Eklund, along with Johan P. Larsson, has published a new book “The new social exclusion, the development of self-sufficiency and the future of the welfare state” analyzing unemployment and social exclusion among the foreign born in Sweden and the implications for the welfare state. Over the past few decades, Sweden has had a high level of immigration. Today the proportion of foreign-born is almost 20 percent of the population. A large proportion of these immigrants are unemployed, and as a result, in 2018 Sweden had the highest employment gap between domestic and foreign born in Europe. Almost half of the foreign-born with a non-Western background are not economically self-sufficient.

In the book, the authors present statistics on the prevalence and geography of social exclusion. They explore the consequences of social exclusion for the economy, for the Swedish model.

Johan E Eklund is Chief Economist of Sydsvenska Industri och Handelskammaren, professor at BTH and Jönköping International Business School, (JIBS) Johan P Larsson is Associate Professor University of Cambridge and affiliated with Jönköping International Business School, (JIBS).