The Programme for Government indicated that under a Universal Health Insurance system, the State would "pay insurance premia for people on low incomes and subsidise premia for people on middle incomes". This paper examines issues in the design of such a subsidy scheme, in the context of overall...

The Irish healthcare system includes a complex mix of entitlements - some are universal, others age-related, and some are income-related. In this report, we concentrate on the major income-related entitlements in the current system i.e., the Medical Card and the GP Visit Card. Most medical cards...

This paper uses new data from EU-SILC for twenty-six European countries to examine the structure and distribution of material deprivation in the enlarged EU. We identify three distinct dimensions of material deprivation relating to consumption, household facilities and neighbourhood environment,...

In this paper we seek to make use of the newly available Irish component of the European Union Statistics on Income and Living Conditions (EU-SILC) in order to develop a measure of consistent poverty that overcomes some of the difficulties associated with the original indicators employed as...

An important aspect of the impact of the economic crisis is how pay in the public sector responds in the face not only of the evolution of pay in the private sector, but also extreme pressure on public spending (of which pay is a very large proportion) as fiscal deficits soar. What are the...

In this paper, using Ireland, where debt issues are of particular salience as a test case, we seek to understand the extent to which the measures currently employed as national indicators of poverty and social exclusion succeed in capturing over-indebtedness and, more broadly, severity of debt...

The empirical association between income inequality, population health and other social problems is now well established and the research literature suggests that the relationship is not artefactual. Debate is still ongoing as to the cause of this association. Wilkinson, Marmot and colleagues...

In this paper we seek to put Irish poverty rates in a comparative European context. We do so in a context whereby the Irish economic boom and EU enlargement have led to increasing reservations being expressed regarding rates deriving from the EU 'at risk of poverty' indicator. Our comparative...

In this paper we apply self organising maps (SOM) to a detailed set of material deprivation indicators from the Irish component of European Union Community Statistics on Income and Living Conditions (EU-SILC). The first stage of our analysis involves the identification and description of sixteen...