Abstract

This paper summarizes the arguments and counterarguments within the scientific discussion on the issue of the institutional quality of the social sector, its measurement, and the impact of institutional transformations on the creation of positive social results. The main purpose of the research is to pre-sent an empirical study of the relationship between the quality of social sector institutions and the pa-rameters of social and economic development, social activity and trust, subjectively evaluated by indi-viduals. The evaluation of macro impact (positive social results at the macrolevel) were evaluated based on three components: health, wellbeing, and political engagement. The findings showed a direct significant relationship between the quality of social institutions on the one hand and health and well-being on the other. The obtained results do not allow to substantiate enough the connection between the quality of social institutions and social confidence and involvement in political life without con-ducting additional research. However, the level of social confidence and the desire to participate in public and political life directly depends on the level of economic development of the country (GDP per capita).

The analysis was carried out for 11 countries (Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, Germany, Esto-nia, Finland, France, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Poland, Sweden). For the countries under consideration, it can be stated that the social sector creates social value, significant, long-term changes in people’s lives are conditioned by the development of institutions, their quality. So, governments that are now choosing a social sector model need to focus their efforts primarily on creating quality institu-tions. At the same time, they should focus their efforts on the collection of reliable data, allowing for a deeper analysis of the social sector development, to improve on this basis the methodology for as-sessing social impact, especially at the macroeconomic level.

Keywords: impact, social sector, institutions, assessment, health, well-being, political engagement.

JEL Classification: O10, C38.

Cite as: Bagmet, K.V., Haponova, O. (2018). Assessing the Impact on Social Sector: A Macroeconomic Approach. SocioEconomic Challenges, 3(2), 103-108. DOI: 10.21272/sec.3(2).103-108.2018

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