| Summary: | Background: In Sweden the national labour market policies are administered by the Public Employment Service which is in charge of assessing job-seekers’ need for support in the process of reaching employment. Equality is a fundamental principle for the administration. Neither ethnicity nor the person’s economical situation should influence the assessment. At the same time job-seekers are entitled to an individual assessment. Although the state has a national responsibility for labour market policy since the 1990s different municipal labour market interventions have also developed. Aim: To investigate the impact of different income support systems (unemployment benefit/activity support or social assistance) and ethnicity on the assessments made by public employment officers. Method: The study used a quantitative method with a questionnaire in the form of a factorial vignette experiment with fictitious cases in which only one factor/variable changed. 118 respondents at eight employment offices completed the survey between 20 January and 1 April 2020. Correlation analyses were performed using crosstabs (Cramers V) and Chi2-tests. Wilcoxon signed-rank tests were used to compare data at two different times (first and second phase of the survey). Results: Employment officers advocated support at the employment service/external operator as their first choice in 86 per cent of cases, against municipal labour market interventions as first choice in 14 per cent of cases. There were statistically significant differences in the assessments based on the form of income support in all three vignettes. Unemployment benefit/activity support and social assistance resulted in statistically significant different assessments. Employment officers want to refer job-seekers with social assistance to municipal labour market interventions more often than they do with those with unemployment benefit or activity income. No significant differences in the assessments were observed regarding the ethnicity of job-seekers. Conclusions: The study shows that in the process of labour market policy assessment not only the job-seeker's ability to work and the need for support to find a job is evaluated, but the income support system of the job-seeker plays a role. The differences in assessments based on the job-seekers' form of income may be due to categorisations. These categorisations may spring from stereotypical views of job-seekers benefiting from social assistance, or may be due to institutional factors with two different income support systems for the unemployed, or lastly spring from a lack of clarity regarding borders and distribution between national and municipal labour market policies. Regardless the reason, the categorisations might lead to significant consequences for job-seekers with social assistance, who in addition to a lower level of economical compensation also risk being referred to municipal labour market interventions. These are sometimes designed to be a demand for activity in return for receiving social assistance and do not always have as their primary purpose to strengthen working capacity. Based on the results of the study, Sweden thereby does not live up to being a universal welfare state with social citizenship, since social rights do not apply equally to all job seekers.
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