This paper introduces cash transfers targeting the poor in an incomplete markets model with heterogeneous agents facing idiosyncratic risk. These transfers change the degree of insurance in the economy and aect precautionary motives asymmetrically, leading the poorest households to decrease...

A public job can be seen as a source of insurance against income risk. Indeed, many public employees have job stability, which is compounded with a less volatile and more compressed wage distribution. Hence, by increasing its number of public employees, the government enhances the overall degree...