In all societies intergenerational transfers are large and have an important influence on inequality and growth. The development of each generation of youth depends on the resources that it receives from productive members of society for health, education, and sustenance. The well-being of the...

This paper extends the Ramsey model's normative analysis to issues of generational welfare and intergenerational transfers. A planner, who maximizes the discounted welfare of an endless stream of generations, is intrinsically biased against larger cohorts, which are more costly to provide...

This paper develops a theory of intergenerational exchange for generations that are either selfish or have non-dynastic altruism. The main building blocks of the theory are forward and backward intergenerational goods (FIGs and BIGs) and the relationship between them. A FIG is a transfer from...

This study estimated the effects of welfare reform in the 1990s, which permanently restructured and contracted the cash assistance system in the U.S., on food insecurity--a fundamental form of hardship--of the next generation of households. An implicit goal underlying welfare reform was the...

Transfers from parents--either in the form of gifts or inheritances--have received much attention as a source of inequality. This paper uses a 19-year panel of administrative data for the population of Norway to examine the share of the Total Inflows available to an individual (defined as the...

In this paper I develop a positive theory of intergenerational transfers. I argue that transfers are a means to induce retirement. that is, to buy the elderly out of the labor force. The reason why societies choose to do such a thing is that aggregate output is higher if the elderly do not work....

Conditional cash transfer programs have spread to over 80 countries in the past two decades, but little is known about their long-term effects on the youth they target. This paper estimates the impact of childhood exposure to the Mexican program Progresa on economic outcomes in early adulthood...

Strong intergenerational correlations in various types of welfare use have fueled a long-standing debate over whether welfare receipt in one generation causes welfare participation in the next generation. Some claim a causal relationship in welfare receipt across generations has created a...

Can participation in safety net programs have long-lasting negative effects across multiple generations? Prior work shows a 1993 Dutch disability insurance reform which tightened requirements and lowered benefits for participants resulted in better outcomes for their children. We study the third...

Each year parents transfer a great deal of money to their adult children. While intuition might suggest that these transfers are altruistic and made out of concern for the well-being of the children, empirical tests of the model have consistently yielded negative results. However, an important...