The life cycle concept has come to have considerable prominence in Irish social policy debate. However, this has occurred without any systematic effort to link its usage to the broader literature relating to a concept. Nor has there been any detailed consideration of how we should set about...

A large literature has emerged around the strong association between income inequality and average life expectancy and a range of health outcomes including mental well being. Three possible explanations for the association have been offered: that the association is a statistical artefact; the...

A frequent refrain during recent debates on welfare cuts has related to the need to “protect the vulnerable”. However, it is far from clear that a consensus exists on which individuals or groups are to be included under this heading with consequent lack of clarity for the policy implications...

In this paper we address the question of the relative importance of within and between country differences in income and material deprivation in the European Union in the context of recent suggestions that insufficient attention has been paid to cross-national differences. In particular, we...