ABSTRACT
For wage rates are in many cases so low that a small proportion of the unemployed already receive more in the form of benefit or allowances than they would receive, or had been receiving, when employed. It is most unsatisfactory that a man who works should receive less in wages than an unemployed man receives in benefit: it is impossible to deny this. And in addition the unemployed man has greater opportunities of subsidiary earning, and "access to assistance from voluntary and charitable bodies which is denied to the man in regular work". For there are many factors other than benefit rates and wage rates which influence the incentive to work, and the question of whether the benefit rate affects this incentive does not become relevant for the first time when benefit actually approaches wage.
