The term 'family gap' refers to differences in income between households with children and households without children. Previous work has used the welfare state typology proposed by Esping-Andersen to explain differences in family gaps among western nations. This paper contributes to family gap...

Welfare state generosity around work-family policies appears to have somewhat contradictory effects, at least for some measures of gender equality. In particular, it appears that as work-family policies, in encouraging higher levels of women's labor market participation, have also contributed to...

This paper explains redistribution and income inequality by revisiting traditional approaches. First, despite the popularity of two dominant theories, the median voter hypothesis (the Meltzer-Richard model) and power resources theory, they are thought to have contrasting predictions and have...

This is a chapter from a report of a comparative study of child support policy in fourteen countries (Skinner, C., Bradshaw, J. and Davidson, J. (2007) Child support policy: an international perspective, Department for Work and Pensions Research Report 405, Leeds: Corporate Document Services....

Class differences in attitudes towards redistribution are compared across European countries. Two main competing hypotheses are tested, using scatterplots and multi-level modelling. The first is that class differences in attitudes are affected mainly by real class stratification, so that class...

This paper advances the understanding of income inequality by examining quintile shares of income among households headed by someone age 25-59 in 14 OECD nations. In examining quintile shares, the author attempts to resolve the contradictory findings from past research. Furthermore, the analysis...

Aggregate data shows an inverse relationship between female employment and income inequality. This paper investigates this relationship using micro-data for seventeen OECD countries. In all countries, female earnings exert an equalising force on the distribution of income in spite of large...

This paper surveys the rise of income inequality in affluent nations. Social programs are critical to keeping inequality in check, but their sustainability is increasingly threatened. A possible solution is high levels of employment.

We use data from the Luxembourg Income Study in order to quantify the economy-wide monetary gains achieved by household-size economies due to within-household sharing of goods by individuals living in multimember households. In most countries out of the twenty countries we examine, we observe a...

This paper aims at identifying the conditions which drive successful family policy. Therefore, it is necessary to know the economic and sociodemographic situation of families which is investigated in eight OECD countries. Special attention is drawn to income, education and labor supply of the...