The significant departure of southern welfare states from continental or Bismarckian welfare states lies on the fact that “the schemes of these countries provide generous protection (at least in principle: e.g. pensions) to the core sectors of the labour force located within the regular or ’institutional’ labour market” and “they only provide weak subsidization to those located in the so-called irregular or non-institutional market (a fairly large occupational sector)” (Ferrera 1996: