Saul Schwartz

• Phone: 613-520-2600 x 2542
• Email: saul_schwartz@carleton.ca
• Office: 5212 River Building
• CV: View CV

Recent Publications

• Hanes, R., Schwartz, S. & Werk, N. (2011). Disability and Educational Success: An Analysis of PALS 2006.
• Ben-Ishai, S., Schwartz, S., & Telfer, T. (2011). A retrospective on the Canadian consumer bankruptcy system: 40 years after the Tassé report. Canadian Business Law Journal, 50, 236-258.
• Schwartz, S. (2010). Can financial education improve financial literacy and retirement planning? IRPP Study No. 12. Montreal: Institute for Research on Public Policy.
• Ben-Ishai, S., & Schwartz, S., with Baretto, J. (2010). The role of government in the overindebtedness of the economically disadvantaged. Queen’s Law Journal, 35(2), 539-568.
• Zabel, J., Schwartz, S., & Donald, S. (2010). An analysis of the impact of SSP on wages. Empirical Economics.
• Zabel, J., Schwartz, S., & Donald, S. (2010). The impact of the Self-Sufficiency Project on the employment behaviour of former welfare Recipients. Canadian Journal of Economics, 43(3), 882-918.

Research Interests

Broadly speaking, my research involves the analysis of policies aimed at helping the poor. Welfare reform has been a consistent interest over the years, highlighted by my long-standing involvement with the experimental analysis of the Canadian Self-Sufficiency Project (SSP), a demonstration project that subsidized work by long-term welfare recipients. My work with Jennifer Stewart on the duration of low-wage work is in this line of research.

Efforts to increase post-secondary access are another analytic focus, as demonstrated by: (1) my on-going involvement in the large demonstration projects that the Canada Millennium Scholarship Foundation (CMSF) has undertaken; (2) my current research on post-secondary affordability (with Sandy Baum of the College Board) and; (3) several works-in-progress on the effects of working for pay while in university and college (with Anne Motte of the CMSF).

While the above efforts involve the econometric analysis of survey data, my work on personal bankruptcy with Stephanie Ben-Ishai of the Osgoode Hall Law School is almost entirely qualitative and relies on interviews of government officials, interviews with low-income debtors and analyses of the current legal environment. I am also involved, as a member of the Board of the European Coalition for Responsible Credit (ECRC), in the European battle between large financial institutions and small consumer organizations over the regulation of EC consumer credit laws. My on-going work on financial regulation as an alternative to financial education grows from this ECRC connection.