This paper provides compelling evidence that equity market liberalization, as the most efficient way to smooth financial market frictions such as credit constraints, can alleviate persistent cross-dynastic income inequality by promoting increased human capital accumulation. The authors examine...

In view of rising wage inequality and increasing poverty, the introduction of a legal minimum wage has recently become an important policy issue in Germany. We analyze the distributional effects of the introduction of a nationwide legal minimum wage of € 7.5 per hour on the basis of a...

In-work transfers are often seen as a good trade-off between redistribution and efficiency, as they alleviate poverty among low-wage households while increasing financial incentives to work. The present study explores the consequences of extending these transfers in Ireland, where support for...

Using counterfactual microsimulations, Shapley decompositions of time change in inequality and poverty indices make it possible to disentangle and quantify the relative effect of tax-benefit policy changes, compared to all other effects including shifts in the distribution of market income....

The retirement decision is under researched in developing and emerging countries, despite the topic's close relation to many development issues such as poverty reduction and social security, and despite the fact that population ageing will increasingly challenge the developing world. This paper...

The Special Report on Emissions Scenarios (SRES) has been widely used to analyze climate change impacts, vulnerability and adaptation. The storylines behind these scenarios outline alternative development pathways, which have been the base for climate research and other studies at global,...

The reform of the cash-based welfare program for single mothers in the US which occurred in the 1990s was the most important since its inception in 1935. The reforms imposed credible and enforceable work requirements into the program for the first time, as well as establishing time limits on...

We interpret social transfers broadly as a set of measures to reduce or relieve poverty, and study how well this purpose is served in the countries that participated in the European Union Statistics on Income and Living Conditions in 2007. Motivated by the findings, we characterise a social...