In the social policy debate, fundamentally different ideas prevail about the interlinkages between such key variables as employment, low pay, social transfers and poverty. This paper presents basic empirical evidence on the validity of these ideas and the policy prescriptions that follow from...

While all nations value low poverty, high levels of economic self-reliance, and equality of opportunity for younger persons, they differ dramatically in the extent to which they reach these goals. Most nations have remarkable similarities in the sources of social concern within each nation -...

The aim of this paper is to identify the age-, sex- and cause-specific premature mortality rates contributing to the association between life expectancy and income distribution in developed countries. On finding evidence suggesting that reported income distribution is strongly affected by low...

The article adapts the Rawlsian idea of decision-making behind the veil of ignorance in the realm of income transfer systems. As rational decision-makers we would plan a society where the incidence of poverty is low, differences in the level of living between life cycles are small, income...

In the first section of the study, we analyze the cross-sectional relationship between poverty rates and the income level of the poor. Thereafter, we take a close look at changes in time: how poverty and 'richness' rates and changes in the income of the poor and the rich are related to each...