Getting the smaller picture: small-area analysis of public expenditure incidence and deprivation in three English cities

This paper examines public expenditure incidence at small-area level in cities. The motivations for such research are briefly reviewed. The article reports on an attempt at measuring public expenditure across the majority of programmes down to the level of Census wards and the actual results obtained for three urban local authorities in England. The relationship between spending, income and deprivation is examined overall and for particular spending programmes, using a number of approaches including regression-based expenditure models. The conclusions suggest that spending is indeed targetted on poorer areas but raise questions about both the strength of this relationship and how best to measure deprivation and the need to spend.