According to the 'median-voter' hypothesis, greater inequality in the market distribution of earnings or income tends to produce greater generosity in redistributive policy. We outline the steps in the causal chain specified by the hypothesis and attempt to assess these steps empirically. Prior...

For a long time conventional wisdom held that income inequality enhances investment and work incentives and thereby is good for economic growth. In the 1990s this view was turned on its head, as a number of empirical analyses found an association between inequality and slower growth across large...

We analyze the impact of the state on the incidence of poverty in the working-age population of 14 advanced capitalist democracies between 1970 and 1997 using an unbalanced panel design. We utilize poverty measures based on micro-level data from the Luxembourg Income Study in conjunction with...