The last decade has seen a sharp increase in interest in the possible existence of a Paradox of Redistribution (PoR) whereby narrow targeting of social transfers aimed at increasing their redistributive (poverty) impact has the perverse effect of increasing poverty over the medium term due to...

This paper embeds analysis of fiscal redistribution (FR) within the standard social welfare framework. Differences in FR are decomposed into differences in the magnitude (fiscal effort) and progressivity (fiscal progressivity) of transfers. Progressivity is further decomposed into differences in...

Fiscal policy is a key tool for achieving distributional objectives in advanced economies. This paper embeds the discussion of fiscal redistribution within the standard social welfare framework, which lends itself to a transparent and practical evaluation of the extent and determinants of fiscal...

Fiscal policy is a key tool for achieving distributional objectives in advanced economies. Thispaper embeds the discussion of fiscal redistribution within the standard social welfareframework, which lends itself to a transparent and practical evaluation of the extent anddeterminants of fiscal...

The distributional characteristic provides an attractive alternative to conventional approaches used to evaluate the targeting performance of transfer programs. We decompose it into two components that are useful both conceptually and empirically; one capturing the targeting efficiency of the...

There is a growing debate on the relative merits of universal and targeted social assistancetransfers in achieving income redistribution objectives. While the benefits of targeting areclear, i.e., a larger poverty impact for a given transfer budget or lower fiscal cost for a givenpoverty impact,...