learn$ave Project: Final ReportTable 5.8Effects of Program Design Parameters, Income Assistance Status, Participant Characteristics, <strong>and</strong> Unemployment Rate onCummulative Savings <strong>and</strong> Proportion of Months Saved: Regression Coefficients, learn$ave-plus <strong>and</strong> Non-experimental ParticpantsExplanatory VariablesProgram ParametersMatch rate(no. of $ matched per $ saved)CumulativeEligible SavingsProportion of EligibleMonths with EligibleSavings310.3** 0.117**Match rate squared -42.4** -0.006Saving period 24 months 4.9 0.063***Match cap (in $100s) 34.1*** 0.010***Participant/SiteCharacteristics (at baseline)Micro-enterprise stream(vs Education)102.4*** 0.004Received IA (vs not) -206.8*** -0.043***Male (vs female) -82.4*** -0.055***Immigrant (vs non-immigrant) 311.2*** 0.059***Aged 26 to 40 (vs
learn$ave Project: Final Reportto social assistance regulations in place on participantsavings. As noted in Robson (2008), provinces in Canadaall have some but varied rules on how much, when<strong>and</strong> what kinds of savings IA recipients can have oraccumulate without penalty to their income assistancebenefits. While an increasing number of provinces have,since learn$ave was launched, moved to exempt, fully orpartially, savings held in IDA accounts, these exemptionswere rare <strong>and</strong> not universal across the project whenlearn$ave was implemented. In Ontario, for example, IAparticipants were cautioned to manage their learn$aveparticipation within their applicable Ontario Worksasset limit. For a single employable person, this wouldhave meant saving no more than $520 before stopping,either permanently or to cash out their savings <strong>and</strong> thensave again. This may have created a disincentive to savetoo much in the learn$ave account <strong>and</strong> in fact researchoutside of learn$ave (see Robson, 2008 for a review)does suggest that low-income populations may managetheir assets <strong>and</strong> dissave in response to real or perceivedasset limits for programs of last resort even when theyare not currently dependent on social assistance incomebenefits. Since learn$ave was launched in 2000, at leastsix jurisdictions (BC, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba,Quebec <strong>and</strong> Nova Scotia) have moved to exempt personal<strong>and</strong> matched savings in recognized IDA programs fortheir IA clients (Robson, 2008).Nevertheless, despite the lower than project averagesavings levels <strong>and</strong> regularity, the IA participants inlearn$ave did demonstrate that even the very lowestincomeparticipants in IDA programs may respond tothe incentive of a matched savings program. Given thetightly constrained budgets they face, it is remarkableusing a traditional lens that any IA participants were ableto save at all. Robson (2008) proposes that higher <strong>and</strong>more flexible asset limits for IA participants, combinedwith the kind of financial incentives offered in learn$ave,may actually be associated with increases in welfare exitswhen the accumulated savings are used as investmentsfor productive forms of capital. The current study cannotverify this claim <strong>and</strong> it is unknown from the data availablethrough the PMIS whether learn$ave participants on IA atbaseline were still dependent on IA after cashing out theirsavings. Just as other participants were expected to seelong-term returns on their investment in adult educationthrough learn$ave, IA participants might see an improvementin their well-being over the longer run which wewill not be able to capture in this study.In summaryLow-income Canadians recruited into learn$ave did, onaverage, make use of the accounts <strong>and</strong> financial incentivesoffered by the project. Nearly all opened an account, mostsaved something, <strong>and</strong> most used the matched credits.The analysis showed that income levels <strong>and</strong> financialconstraints at baseline could not predict outcomes insavings <strong>and</strong> matched credit use. This finding contrastswith concerns expressed by critics of asset-buildingapproaches that low-income populations do not haveresources to allow any savings at all.There was considerable variation in the ways thatparticipants responded to the incentives of the accounts.Five distinguishable patterns of account use wereidentified:• Unsuccessful or disengaged participants: who seem to havesimply lost interest in the project.• Struggling savers, low investors: whose patterns ofsaving <strong>and</strong> dissaving for non-project purposes suggestthe presence of significant barriers (financial, time,opportunity costs, attitudinal or other) in accumulating<strong>and</strong> maintaining savings.• Moderate savers <strong>and</strong> investors: who saved a fair amountbut used, on average, about only a half of the matchedcredits they had accumulated, suggesting that investingin education may have proved to be more challengingbecause of changing circumstances or a change of heartabout their interest in the project <strong>and</strong> returning to school.• Early savers, high investors: who saved up all they couldin learn$ave, saved it fast <strong>and</strong> used as much of thematched credits as they could within a short periodof time. Because this pattern was more predominantamong recent immigrants to Canada, it appears that theeligibility rules developed for newcomers applying tothe project may have had an important influence on theproject outcomes.• Determined savers, high investors: who took longer but didsave the maximum <strong>and</strong> also made substantial use of thecredits they had accumulated. While the evidence fromthe early savers <strong>and</strong> the results at the non experimentalsite with a shorter saving period suggest that participantssave most <strong>and</strong> most regularly over a shorter period oftime, these participants remind us of the value of allowingflexibility <strong>and</strong> not imposing sunset clauses too earlywhenever possible.In general, investing the matched credits appearsto have been more challenging for many participantsthan was saving their own money. A significant numberof participants did not use all of the matched creditsthey had earned <strong>and</strong> a significant number used noneof their matched credits at all. We cannot do much<strong>Social</strong> <strong>Research</strong> <strong>and</strong> <strong>Demonstration</strong> <strong>Corp</strong>oration Chapter 5 | 65
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