As the world debates the economic crisis, it does so without considering two historically important ideas: the stigmatization of miserliness and the prohibition of usury. Although these ideas were once keystones of society, they are missing from the current discourse. This paper seeks to...

This chapter reviews the theory of the voluntary public and private redistribution of wealth elaborated by economic analysis in the last forty years or so. The central object of the theory is altruistic gift-giving, construed as benevolent voluntary redistribution of income or wealth. The theory...

This paper explains how to build Lorenz Curves for income distributions and discusses their use for inequality measurement. A short conceptual background, a step-by-step procedure and a simple numerical example illustrate how to calculate and draw Lorenz Curves. A discussion on the use of Lorenz...

This paper illustrates how Lorenz Curves can be used to identify the best income distribution on social welfare grounds, within a set of alternative income distributions generated by different policy options. After highlighting some drawbacks of using specific functional forms of the Social...

This paper illustrates how Crossing Generalised Lorenz (GL) curves can be used to identify the best income distribution on social welfare grounds within a set of alternative income distributions generated by different policy options. It starts by illustrating two alternative income distributions...

A comparison of the 2007-08 crisis with that of 1929 showed its extreme gravity, but it also may have implied that the old harmful mistakes would not be repeated. After four years, the crisis has not been solved and it even threatens to worsen. Neo-conservative Republicans claim that this is...

In this document we may find the main characteristics about the food security situation in the Mesoamerican countries. The insufficient nourishment and nutrition, as well the poverty condition that involve an important proportion of the Central American and Mexican population, produce and human...

How should we make interpersonal comparisons of well-being levels and differences? One branch of welfare economics eschews such comparisons, which are seen as impossible or unknowable; normative evaluation is based upon criteria such as Pareto or Kaldor-Hicks efficiency that require no...

An ongoing debate has centered on whether redistribution should be attained solely through taxes and transfer payments, or also via the private law. The most powerful argument against redistribution through private law is grounded on economic considerations. Accordingly, legal rules are more...

This paper argues that a sweatshop worker's choice to accept the conditions of his or her employment is morally significant, both as an exercise of autonomy and as an expression of preference. This fact establishes a moral claim against interference in the conditions of sweatshop labor by third...