Switch from welfare to low-paying work ‘costs 5% of income’

A person moving from unemployment benefit to a low-paying job loses about 5% of his income, but the OECD and IMF make widely different proposals on how to tackle what they say as a disincentive to work.

However, even with changes, the possibility of finding a job for the 304,000 unemployed will be very difficult as Ireland’s GDP would need to grow at an average of 4% a year to get back to pre-crisis levels, the IMF has warned.

In its annual report on eurozone policies, the IMF said EU policy makers have not broken the link between sovereigns and banks. It urged the ECB to play a greater role to ease the crisis.