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Adequacy of Social Minimums: Workfare, Gender, and Poverty Alleviation in Welfare Democracies

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  • Kenneth Nelson

Abstract

In the Western countries poverty has increased along with the resurgence of low-income targeting and the increased conditionality of social assistance. This paper provides new evidence on the relationship between social minimums and income adequacy by examining the extent to which social benefits distribute income at levels necessary to escape poverty. The empirical analyzes combine macro-level institutional data and micro-level income data for 17 industrialized welfare democracies. It is shown that the period 1990-1995 is characterized primarily by stagnation, whereas social assistance adequacy declined in the latter half of the nineties. In most countries, social assistance fails to provide income above the poverty threshold, something that makes it difficult to conceive benefits as just redistributive instruments.

Suggested Citation

  • Kenneth Nelson, 2008. "Adequacy of Social Minimums: Workfare, Gender, and Poverty Alleviation in Welfare Democracies," LIS Working papers 474, LIS Cross-National Data Center in Luxembourg.
    • Handle: RePEc:lis:liswps:474
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    1. Nelson, Kenneth, 2007. "Introducing SaMip: The Social Assistance and Minimum Income Protection Interim Dataset," Working Paper Series 11/2007, Stockholm University, Swedish Institute for Social Research.
    2. Kenneth Nelson, 2004. "Mechanisms of Poverty Alleviation," LIS Working papers 372, LIS Cross-National Data Center in Luxembourg.
    3. Handler, Joel F., 2005. "Myth and ceremony in workfare: rights, contracts, and client satisfaction," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 34(1), pages 101-124, February.
    4. Susanna Sandström & Timothy Smeeding, 2005. "Poverty and Income Maintenance in Old Age: A Cross-National View of Low Income Older Women," LIS Working papers 398, LIS Cross-National Data Center in Luxembourg.
    5. Ferrera, Maurizio & Hemerijck, Anton & Rhodes, Martin, 2000. "Recasting European Welfare States for the 21st Century," European Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 8(3), pages 427-446, July.
    6. White, Stuart, 2003. "The Civic Minimum: On the Rights and Obligations of Economic Citizenship," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780198295051, Decembrie.
    7. Walter Korpi, 2000. "Faces of Inequality: Gender, Class and Patterns of Inequalities in Different Types of Welfare States," LIS Working papers 224, LIS Cross-National Data Center in Luxembourg.
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