What happened to people who left benefit system during the year ended 30 June 2014

This report helps build understanding of what happens to people when they leave the benefit system, and whether and how their outcomes change over time. 

This research looked at outcomes for people who exited a benefit during the year from 1 July 2013 to 30 June 2014. It follows research undertaken by Superu that looked at people who left the benefit system in 2010/11 (read their research report Off-benefit transitions: Where do people go?)^*. 

We looked at outcomes for 133,000 people who stopped receiving a main benefit in 2013/2014, who:

• had received benefits in each of the three months prior to them exiting
• had been off a benefit for at least a calendar month.

The outcomes looked at over 18 months following an exit from the benefit system were:

• reasons for exit
• earnings following exit into employment
• sustainability of exit and, where relevant, earnings. 

^* Important note: The findings in the Superu report and MSD’s report are not directly comparable. MSD has updated the methodology and data sources to provide a more accurate picture of outcomes for people coming off and on a benefit. To enable a comparison we have refreshed and updated data for the 2010-11 cohort of people leaving the benefit system and used this in our reporting. This is explained further in Appendix 1 of the main report.

Erratum December 2018

Report:

1. Legend of Figure 8.1 – the word “spells” changed to “transitions”. 
2. Figure 8.2 – changed the chart of a split bar chart from a scaled stacked bar chart.
3. Paragraph below Figure 8.2 – changed words to “People who have exited from a JS-WR or an emergency benefit make up a higher proportion of those who have had multiple benefit spells than they do of those who have not. The reverse is true for other benefit types”from “A high proportion of those people who have exited from an emergency benefit have had multiple benefit spells. Almost half of the people exiting from a JS-HCD and almost 60 percent of those from a JS-WR benefit have had multiple benefit spells in the previous two years”.

 Summary:

1. Page 7, legend of the second graph – changed wording to “3 or more spells on benefit in the last 2 years” from “2 or more spells on benefit in the last 2 years”.
2. Page 7, legend of the second graph – changed wording to “2 or less spells on benefit in the last 2 years” from “1 benefit spell in the last 2 years”.