Given the ubiquity of risk management by welfare states one might expect thatempirical investigations of the role of risk exposure on social policy attitudeshave a long tradition in the field. Yet, while the relationship between risk andsocial policy at the macro-level has prominently figured in the literature fordecades, the first empirical contribution exploring the link between risk andsocial policy preferences at the micro-level appeared only in 2001 (Iversen andSoskice 2001). This trailblazing study by Torben Iversen and David Soskicefocuses on the relationship between social policy attitudes and one particularrisk: asset specificity, that is, the degree to which skills are portable acrossemployers. However, the portability of skills is only one of several aspectsthat contribute to one's risk exposure in the labor market. For example,David Rueda's important work singles out job protection, which variesbetween labor market insiders and outsiders, and argues that their interests“are fundamentally different” (Rueda 2005, 62). A measure that isbroader than “asset specificity,” therefore, seems to bedesirable.

The Measurement of Risk Exposure

How can we measure risk exposure in order to test a central micro-levelimplication of my theoretical framework, namely, that risk exposure correlateswith social policy attitudes? Individuals face numerous risks that are –or could be – covered by social insurance programs, ranging from“old risks” (accidents at the workplace, old age, sickness, andunemployment) to “new risks” (lack of skills, single parenthood,domestic care, etc.) (Armingeon and Bonoli 2006; Taylor-Gooby 2005). Ideally, wewould want to have – objective and subjective – measures of riskexposure in these different domains (labor market, family, health, retirement)as well as an overall measure of an individual's degree of risk exposurein all realms of life. While one survey (discussed and employed later) movesinto that direction, existing domain-specific and overall risk exposure measuresare not available cross-nationally, and they are purely subjective. Because mygoal is not only to evaluate the impact of risk exposure on social policyattitudes (this chapter) but also to compare and contrast risk distributionsacross countries and over time (in later chapters), cross-national availabilityand an objective measure are crucial for my purposes.