This paper explores the capability of the state to affect the individual's decision to work for free. For this purpose we combine individual-level data from the European and World Values Survey with macroeconomic and political variables for OECD member countries. Empirically we identify three...

We analyze the effect of the projected demographic transition on the political support for social security, and equilibrium outcomes. Embedding a probabilistic-voting setup of electoral competition in the Diamond (1965) OLG model, we find that intergenerational transfers arise in the absence of...

We extend "economic equivalence" results, like the Ricardian equivalence proposition, to the political sphere where policy is chosen sequentially. We derive conditions under which a policy regime (summarizing admissible policy choices in every period) and a state are "politico-economically...

This paper examines the effects of recent welfare reforms in the US and UK on the well-being of children in low-income families, looking specifically at the effects on poverty, family expenditures, and child health and development. The paper finds some commonalities but also some notable...

Does the supply of a welfare state create its own demand? Many economic scholars studying welfare arrangements refer to Say's law and insinuate a self-destructive welfare state. However, little is known about the empirical validity of these assumptions and hypotheses. We study the dynamic effect...

This paper presents new evidence for major world regions and for the most populous countries in each region on associations between the average ages of populations and three groups of economic outcomes: (1) macroeconomic aggregates (domestic saving as a share of GDP, GDP per capita, capital per...

Latin America is a volatile, crisis-prone region, with limited and inadequate social insurance. Therefore, the long-term as well as the recent poor suffer significantly during crises. Furthermore, social spending is procyclical in the region, but less so than total spending, indicating that the...

This paper assesses the effects of total public debt (external and domestic) on social expenditure worldwide and in Latin America using an unbalanced panel of around 50 countries for the period 1985-2003. The most robust and important finding is that higher debt ratios do reduce social...

No voters cast their votes based on perfect information, but better educated and richer voters are on average better informed than others. We develop a model where the voting mistakes resulting from low political knowledge reduce the weight of poor voters, and cause parties to choose political...