Risks at Work: The Demand and Supply Sides of Government Redistribution

To comprehend how the welfare state adjusts to economic shocksit is important to get a handle on both the genesis of popularpreferences and the institutional incentives for governmentsto respond to these preferences. This paper attempts to do both,using a general theoretical framework and detailed data at boththe individual and national levels. In a first step, we focuson how risk exposure and income are related to preferences forredistribution. To test our hypotheses, we extract detailedrisk-exposure measures from labour-force surveys and marry themto cross-national opinion survey data. Results from analysisof these data attest to the great importance of risks withinthe labour market in shaping popular preferences for redistributiveefforts by governments. In a second step, we turn our attentionto the supply side of government redistribution. Institutions,we argue, mediate governments' reactions to redistributionaldemands following economic shocks. Using time-series cross-countrydata, we demonstrate how national training systems, and electoralinstitutions, as well as partisanship, shape government responses. Footnotes ¹ E-mail addresses: tom{at}wz-berlin.de; iversen{at}fas.harvard.edu;pr9{at}duke.edu     

Recidivism among Welfare Recipients: The Role of Neighborhood and Access to Employment

Work requirements and time limitations on benefits have forced welfare administrators to be more aggressive in moving welfare recipients into the workplace. This paper tracks a cohort of Georgia welfare leavers from 1992 to 2001, estimating the timing of recidivism using duration models. Of the case heads that leave the program within a two-year period, 15.3 percent remain out of welfare for less than three months and 35 percent returned within one year. There is also a relatively high risk of welfare recidivism for a much longer period than estimated in previous studies. Furthermore, successful employment may be affected not only by the presence of job growth but also by the industrial mix in which jobs are growing and by the residential location of welfare leavers.     

老年社会福利制度构建

积极应对我国人口老龄化问题,可以借鉴西方发展型社会理论中的包容性发展、社会投资、共同治理等理念,突破传统社会政策的局限,建设积极理性的老年社会福利价值体系,制定政策措施,完善我国的老年社会福利制度。     

从福利国家到社会投资国家:吉登斯关于福利体制的再造

福利国家在创造神话的同时,也创造了它自己的潜在挑战。这一挑战最终导致自20世纪70年代以来人们对福利国家信念的普遍动摇。一方面,左派因福利国家体制所具有的改良主义倾向而对其大张挞伐;另一方面,鼓吹市场原教旨主义的自由主义思潮卷土重来且日渐甚嚣尘上。吉登斯于20世纪90年代所提出的"社会投资国家"构想,事实上成为对西方资本主义世界摆脱福利国家泥沼所开具的一剂良方。建设社会投资国家思想,是一种从根本上突破贝弗里奇式消极福利体制的构想。     

Peer Reporting and the Perception of Fairness

Economic motives are not the only reasons for committing a (small) crime. People consider social norms and perceptions of fairness before judging a situation and acting upon it. If someone takes a bundle of printing paper from the office for private use at home, then a colleague who sees this can take action by talking to the offender or someone else (peer reporting). We investigate how fairness perception influences the decision to act upon incorrect behavior or not.     

Justice and Fairness in the Dictator Game

This article uses a laboratory experiment to examine the question of whether justice and fairness are different motivational forces in the dictator game. “Justice” and “fairness” are often used interchangeably because their meanings and usages are so closely linked, despite their distinct connotations. Using four different treatments, our experimental design investigates the subtle differences between the two social concepts to explicate generosity in the dictator game. The results indicate that justice, not fairness, legitimizes property rights in the dictator game.     

程序公平、结果公平在会计信息虚假陈述责任认定中的应用

会计信息虚假陈述(失真)一直是媒体和公众关注的热点问题。因此,完善会计信息虚假陈述民事责任认定标准已经成为恢复投资者信心、重振证券市场的重要工作。法律界与会计界对会计信息虚假陈述责任认定存在着较为明显的分歧。本文在对程序公平和结果公平比较分析的基础上,结合会计工作本身的特点,联系会计信息披露义务人为谨慎人的特征,认为目前在会计信息虚假陈述责任认定中应该以程序公平为主要依据。     

效率与公平:追求和谐的统一

效率与公平的关系是当前经济社会发展中的热点问题。无论是效率，还是公平，其涵义都不是单一的，而是具有多重性，这就决定了两者之间必然暗含着多种组合关系。效率与公平之间并非像人们以往认为的那样是完全对立的，而是具有内在的统一性。效率与公平统一于人的内在需求，两者互为前提、相互促进，必将在历史的发展中实现有机的和谐。     

农村公益性小额信贷现状研究——基于贫困户需求视角的分析

文章基于对山东省嘉祥县3个乡镇(卧龙山镇、大张楼镇、马村镇)小额信贷情况的农户调查数据,从需求视角出发,分析得出小额信贷需求的影响因素和贫困农户需求不足的原因。发现以扶贫为设计初衷的农村小额信贷项目实际参与对象已从中、低收入贫困户转向进行非农生产性经营的中等偏上收入户和高收入农户,并且生产性小额信贷资金多被农户用于消费性支出。最后,文章尝试提出了一些公益性小额信贷的新思路和新模式。     

Political and Economic Inequities and the Shaping of Institutions and Redistribution

This article studies the joint effect of political and economic inequalities on redistributive taxation and institutional quality. The theoretical model suggests that income inequality, coupled with political bias in favor of the rich, decreases redistribution and lowers institutional quality. The effect of the former is to increase productive investment, and the effect of the latter is to decrease it—with resulting ambiguous implications for economic growth. Testing these predictions empirically in a panel of countries, we find that inequality has a negative effect on both institutional quality and redistribution.     

Adverse Selection and the Demand for Supplementary Dental Insurance

In 1995 dental services were excluded from the compulsory health insurance package that covers the families of all Dutch employees in the market sector with incomes below a certain threshold. People had to choose between no insurance and supplementary insurance. The exclusion of dental services was unexpected and was accompanied by a generous acceptance policy and almost uniform premiums. Due to these features the exclusion constitutes a natural experiment to investigate whether customers with poorer teeth conditions are more likely to buy insurance. This is a key condition for adverse selection to matter. The empirical results show that adverse selection indeed occurs; individuals with poor teeth condition are more likely to choose insurance. The same holds for customers with more frequent visits in the past. Differences in prices play some role, whereas differences in income do not.     

个人利益,分配公平与再分配偏好——基于中国微观数据的实证研究

本文从中国居民再分配偏好较高这一现状出发,致力于从"个人利益"和"分配公平"两个角度对其进行解释。根据Roemer的理论,本文从"成功可控性"的角度构造了反映居民分配公平观念的变量,并利用中国综合社会调查(2006)的数据和有序选择模型进行实证,我们发现:中国居民的再分配偏好不但存在对自身利益的考虑,也有显著的追求分配公平的动机,越认为"受过良好的教育"、"聪明才智"、"社会关系"、"认识有权的人"或"命运"对事业成功重要的居民,再分配偏好越高,而越认为"努力工作"和"政治表现"对事业成功重要的居民再分配偏好越低。本文还对模型的内生性问题进行了较深入的考察,增强了结论的稳健性。总之,保障社会机会均等、维护分配公平对于降低中国居民的再分配偏好具有重要意义。     

Welfare spending and mortality rates for the elderly before the Social Security era

We analyze the impact of the original means-tested old-age assistance (OAA) programs on the health of the elderly prior to the first Social Security pension payments. Before 1935 a number of states had enacted their own OAA laws. After 1935 the federal government began offering matching grants and thus stimulated the adoption of OAA programs by the states. A new panel data set of 75 cities for each year between 1929 and 1938 combines mortality rates for older age groups with three measures of the OAA programs, spending on non-age-specific relief and a rich set of correlates. The data are analyzed using difference-in-difference-in-difference and instrumental variables methods. Our results suggest that old-age assistance in the 1930s had little impact on the death rate of the elderly. Our sense is that the OAA programs in the 1930s transferred the elderly from general relief programs without necessarily increasing the resources available to them.     

Structural Changes in the Demand for Labor

This paper investigates why labor demand has shifted away from low-skilled toward high-skilled labor in The Netherlands. We focus on the role of changes in relative wages and technological progress. A flexible functional form, proposed by Diewert and Wales, the Symmetric Generalized McFadden cost function, is estimated for the exposed and sheltered sectors. The estimates are based on time-series data for the period 1972–1993, which recently became available. Labor-saving technological change explains most of the displacement of low-skilled workers. The computed elasticities suggest that substitution between labor as a whole and capital is small. However, substitution plays a modest role in the shift from low-skilled toward high-skilled labor, especially in the sheltered sector. Skill-capital complementarity seems relevant in both sectors.     

房屋租赁的替代效应与福利评价

租房还是买房是每位住房需求者需要面临的重大决策。本文通过建立代表性消贡者购房与租房决策选择模型,对代表性消费者不同住房决策间的相互影响进行了理论分析。并通过引入空间计量分析方法,以中国216个地级市2000年的统计数据为样本对理论分析结果进行了相关实证检验。结论显示,住房租赁市场的发展在空间上具有显著的外溢性,经济适用房的“不经济”引致了住房租赁市场的活跃。以全国和北京市的两次抽样为样本的回归结果显示,获得房屋的产权和提高居住面积均有利于增强住房者对生活的满意程度。     

User Fee Abolition and the Demand for Public Health Care

This research examines the effect of the abolition of user fees in South Africa, a policy implemented in 1994 for uninsured children under the age of six and the elderly uninsured, as well as pregnant and nursing mothers. The analysis focuses on the implementation of the policy and the use of curative public healthcare services by children following strict and fuzzy regression discontinuity designs. The estimates point to statistically insignificant average and local average policy effects, even though the policy appears to have been implemented reasonably effectively, albeit imperfectly. In other words, the policy did not, on average, affect the use of curative public healthcare, at least for those children who should have benefited from the policy.     

Cash Management, Payment Patterns and the Demand for Money

We analyse cash management and payments behaviour using 1990–1994 panel data for Dutch households. The results largely confirm the transactions demand for money theory, including an income elasticity of substantially less than one, and they are consistent with the hypothesis of technology resulting in households' economizing on currency balances. The results indicate up to 40 per cent lower transactions balances in the future, which is affirmed by direct questioning on future expectations. The effect on total money outstanding is considerably lower, due to significant amounts of missing money in hoards, which are insensitive to new developments in the payments system.     

诠释经济和谐视野中的效率与公平

效率与公平是贯穿人类社会始终的两大问题,正确认识效率与公平之间的关系,可以为增进经济和谐提供科学的理论指导.当把效率与公平看作目的时,效率与公平之间的矛盾似乎是不可调和的;当把效率与公平当作增进经济和谐的手段时,效率与公平之间就具有了替代关系.经济和谐的效率标准要求完善社会主义市场经济体制;经济和谐的公平标准要求政府推行促进公平的分配政策.市场主要管效率、政府主要管公平应成为目前处理效率与公平的基本原则.