Take-up and non-take-up of vocational rehabilitation in the financial responsibility of the German Federal Employment Agency: The role of employment status

To regain or remain in employment, people with occupational limitations due to health issues can apply for programmes in the context of vocational rehabilitation. In Germany, 20% of applicants do not take up vocational rehabilitation. Using administrative data on all applicants for whom the German Federal Employment Agency is responsible, logistic and fixed effects regression is applied to identify groups not taking up vocational rehabilitation. Analyses reveal that employed people less often take-up vocational rehabilitation. However, the probability of take-up rises significantly following the loss of employment between two applications. Thus, compared to other applicants employed applicants are at higher risk of not taking-up vocational rehabilitation or of taking it up (too) late. Using social problems theory, it can be argued that occupational limitations are harder to assess in the case of employed applicants. Furthermore, employed applicants have specific fears of losing their status. The reasons for non-take-up or delayed take-up should be investigated furthermore.