Modelling the local impacts of national social policies: a spatial microsimulation approach

The aim of this paper is to provide a new framework for the analysis and th e evaluation of national social policies at the small-area level. In partic ular, the paper shows how microsimulation modelling can be employed to shed new light on the local impacts of major national policy changes such as ta xes, regulations, government consumption, unemployment benefits, job seeker s' and housing allowances, etc. Microsimulation modelling provides the poss ibility of defining the desired effects of economic and social policy, the instruments employed, and also the structural changes of those affected by socioeconomic policy measures. This paper builds on traditional economic mi crosimulation frameworks by adding a geographical dimension. More specifica lly, we seek to model national social policy impacts at a microspatial scal e. First, spatial microsimulation modelling is used to synthesise a househo ld micropopulation geographical database for an entire city. This micropopu lation database has a wide range of demographic and socioeconomic attribute s that are relevant to national social and economic policies and which play a major role in the determination of eligibility of households for various benefits and allowances. GIS software is used to identify the size and spa tial location of particular groups such as the unskilled, low-waged, and un dereducated. Finally, we explore potential social policies and demonstrate how microsimulation modelling can be used to perform what-if social policy analysis at the small-area level.