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More people receive cash benefits

Photo: Frank May / NTB scanpix

In recent years, the share of people using cash support has increased according to an analysis from Statistics Norway (SSB).

The schemes are used most frequently by immigrants and people with low education.

SSB wrote that the share that used the cash benefit scheme had increased from 22% in 2012 to 26% in 2017.

‘’This growth coincides with the fact that the disbursed monthly amount has been substantially upgraded both in 2012, 2014,and 2017. This has improved the relative profitability by utilising the cash support compared to other schemes’’ wrote SSB.

Immigrant parents make greater use of the scheme than other parents: 43 against 17% in 2017.

In the period after 2012, when cash support for two-year-olds was discontinued, the proportion with a background from Africa and Asia receiving cash support fell. During the same period, the proportion of immigrants from Europe receiving support had increased.

There are immigrants with backgrounds from Pakistan, Morocco, Kosovo, Iraq, and Turkey who made the most use of cash support in 2017. For these groups, the proportion was between 60 and 70%.

Otherwise, there is a clear difference between those with high and low education.

‘’In 2017, 34% of all children where the mother hadn’t a secondary school education received the highest level of cash support. The proportion who receive cash support where the mother had completed upper secondary school was 25%, while only 15% received cash support where the mother had education at the university level’’ wrote SSB in its analysis.

© NTB Scanpix / #Norway Today