IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/lev/wrkpap/wp_466.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Net Government Expenditures and the Economic Well-Being of the Elderly in the United States, 1989-2001

Author

Listed:
  • Edward N. Wolff
  • Ajit Zacharias
  • Hyunsub Kum

Abstract

We examine the economic well-being of the elderly, using the Levy Institute Measure of Economic Well-Being (LIMEW). Compared to the conventional measures of income, the LIMEW is a comprehensive measure that incorporates broader definitions of income from wealth, government expenditures, and taxes. It also includes the value of household production. We find that the elderly are much better off, relative to the nonelderly, according to our broader measure of economic well-being than by conventional income measures. The main reason for the higher relative LIMEW of the elderly is the much higher values of income from wealth and net government expenditures for the elderly than the nonelderly. There are pronounced differences in well-being among the population subgroups within the elderly. The older elderly are worse off than the younger elderly, nonwhites are worse off than whites, and singles are worse off than married couples. We also find that the degree of inequality in the LIMEW is substantially higher among the elderly than among the nonelderly. In contrast, inequality in the most comprehensive measure of income published by the Census Bureau is virtually identical among the elderly and nonelderly. The main factor behind the degree of inequality, as the decomposition analysis reveals, is the greater size and concentration of income from nonhome wealth in the LIMEW compared to extended income (EI).

Suggested Citation

  • Edward N. Wolff & Ajit Zacharias & Hyunsub Kum, 2006. "Net Government Expenditures and the Economic Well-Being of the Elderly in the United States, 1989-2001," Economics Working Paper Archive wp_466, Levy Economics Institute.
    • Handle: RePEc:lev:wrkpap:wp_466
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.levyinstitute.org/pubs/wp_466.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Michael S. Rendall & Alden Speare, 1993. "Comparing Economic Well‐Being Among Elderly Americans," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 39(1), pages 1-21, March.
    2. J. Steven Landefeld & Stephanie H. McCulla, 2000. "Accounting For Nonmarket Household Production Within A National Accounts Framework," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 46(3), pages 289-307, September.
    3. Ruggles, Patricia & O'Higgins, Michael, 1981. "The Distribution of Public Expenditure among Households in the United States," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 27(2), pages 137-164, June.
    4. Patricia Ruggles & Michael O'Higgins, 1981. "The Distribution Of Public Expenditure Among Households In The United States," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 27(2), pages 137-164, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Ron Crawford & Grant Johnston, 2004. "Household incomes in New Zealand: The impact of the market, taxes and government spending, 1987/88–1997/98," Treasury Working Paper Series 04/20, New Zealand Treasury.
    2. Benjamin Bridges JR, 1984. "Post-Fisc Distributions of Income: Comment," Public Finance Review, , vol. 12(2), pages 231-240, April.
    3. Edward N. Wolff & Ajit Zacharias & Thomas Masterson & Selçuk Eren & Andrew Sharpe & Elspeth Hazell, 2012. "A Comparison of Inequality and Living Standards in Canada and the United States Using an Expanded Measure of Economic Well-Being," CSLS Research Reports 2012-01, Centre for the Study of Living Standards.
    4. Lustig, Nora & Martinez Pabon, Valentina & Pessino, Carola, 2023. "Fiscal Policy, Income Redistribution, and Poverty Reduction in Latin America," IDB Publications (Working Papers) 13193, Inter-American Development Bank.
    5. Edward N. Wolff & Ajit Zacharias & Asena Caner, 2005. "Household wealth, public consumption and economic well-being in the United States," Cambridge Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 29(6), pages 1073-1090, November.
    6. Edward N. Wolff & Ajit Zacharias, 2007. "The Levy Institute Measure of Economic Well-Being United States, 1989-2001," Eastern Economic Journal, Eastern Economic Association, vol. 33(4), pages 443-470, Fall.
    7. Ali Enami & Nora Lustig & Rodrigo Aranda, 2016. "Analytic Foundations: Measuring the Redistributive Impact of Taxes and Transfers," Commitment to Equity (CEQ) Working Paper Series 25, Tulane University, Department of Economics.
    8. Ali Enami & Nora Lustig & Rodrigo Aranda, 2016. "Analytic Foundations: Measuring the Redistributive Impact of Taxes and Transfers," Commitment to Equity (CEQ) Working Paper Series 1325, Tulane University, Department of Economics.
    9. Lustig, Nora & Martinez Pabon, Valentina & Pessino, Carola, 2023. "Fiscal policy, income redistribution, and poverty reduction in Latin America," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 120683, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    10. Edward C. Kienzle, 1984. "Post-Fisc Distributions of Income: Reply," Public Finance Review, , vol. 12(2), pages 241-244, April.
    11. Ajit Zacharias, 2011. "The Levy Institute Measure of Economic Well-Being, Great Britain, 1995 and 2005," Economics Working Paper Archive wp_668, Levy Economics Institute.
    12. Thomas Masterson & Ajit Zacharias & Selcuk Eren & Edward Wolff, 2011. "The Levy Institute Measure of Economic Well-Being, France, 1989 and 2000," Economics Working Paper Archive wp_679, Levy Economics Institute.
    13. Daniel P. Hewitt, 1987. "The Benefit Incidence of Consumption Public Goods," Public Finance Review, , vol. 15(2), pages 138-165, April.
    14. Lukas Riedel & Holger Stichnoth, 2022. "Government Expenditure in the DINA Framework: Allocation Methods and Consequences for Post-Tax Income Inequality," Working Papers of BETA 2022-06, Bureau d'Economie Théorique et Appliquée, UDS, Strasbourg.
    15. Hamid R. Davoodi & Erwin R Tiongson & Sawitree Sachjapinan Asawanuchit, 2010. "Benefit Incidence of Public Education and Health Spending Worldwide: Evidence From A New Database," Poverty & Public Policy, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 2(2), pages 5-52, May.
    16. Fofack, Hippolyte, 2012. "Accounting for gender production from a growth accounting framework in Sub-Saharan Africa," Policy Research Working Paper Series 6153, The World Bank.
    17. Diewert, Erwin & FOX, Kevin J. & Paul Schreyer, 2017. "The Allocation and Valuation of Time," Microeconomics.ca working papers erwin_diewert-2017-5, Vancouver School of Economics, revised 04 May 2017.
    18. Hozer-Koćmiel Marta & Kuźmiński Wojciech, 2020. "Modelling Unpaid Housework Time in Poland on the Basis of a Time Use Survey," Folia Oeconomica Stetinensia, Sciendo, vol. 20(1), pages 177-189, June.
    19. J. Steven Landefeld & Shaunda Villones, 2009. "National Time Accounting and National Economic Accounting," NBER Chapters, in: Measuring the Subjective Well-Being of Nations: National Accounts of Time Use and Well-Being, pages 113-123, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    20. Merz, Joachim, 2009. "Time Use and Time Budgets – Improvements, Future Challenges and Recommendations," MPRA Paper 16304, University Library of Munich, Germany.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:lev:wrkpap:wp_466. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Elizabeth Dunn (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.levyinstitute.org .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.