Nº 133 (June, 2012). Santiago Garganta & Leonardo Gasparini. 

The program Asignacion Universal por Hijo in Argentina expands to the unemployed and informal workers a benefit previously limited to formal employees. This extension may change work incentives, encouraging lower participation in the formal sector in respect of which it had arisen in the absence of the program. In this paper we estimate the effect over time comparing the group of eligible households (informal, with children), with a similar group but not eligible (no children). The results suggest a significant disincentive to the formalization of the beneficiaries, but no evidence of an incentive to the informality of registered workers.

JEL Code: H55, I38, O17