Child poverty is of growing concern in Ireland and internationally due to the growing body of evidence on the detrimental effects of childhood socio-economic disadvantage on children, both in the short term and in the long term through loss of education, earnings and health. In Ireland, child...

The Yearly Average Method used in calculating State Contributory Pension entitlements has been criticised for creating anomalies, particularly for women. It has been announced that from 2034 onwards, entitlements will be based fully on the new Total Contributions Approach. This paper examines...

Demographic change is putting pressure on the sustainability of State Pension systems in many developed countries. In Ireland, there have been recent calls to reform the system of contributions and/or increase the State Pension age in order to avoid significant shortfalls in the Social Insurance...

In this paper we evaluate the distributional impact of carbon pricing in Ireland via a number of different measures, Excise Duties, Carbon Taxes and the EU Emissions Trading Scheme, utilising information contained in the OECD Effective Carbon Rate (ECR) database together with the PRICES model....

Trade-offs exist in protecting those on lower incomes and ensuring an adequate incentive to work. If benefit entitlements and other supports are withdrawn sharply as income rises, there may be a financial disincentive to enter employment or to work more. The same is true for tax and social...

Housing and health are regarded as pressing concerns for the general public and policymakers in Ireland, but little information exists regarding their relationship. This study utilises data from the EU Survey on Income and Living Conditions (EU-SILC) to examine the correlations between housing...

A series of studies have found that, prior to the introduction of the National Childcare Scheme (NCS), parents in Ireland faced some of the highest childcare costs among OECD countries. To improve childcare affordability, in 2019 the Government introduced the NCS, which awards universal and...

Existing research has shown that disability is costly and can result in an increased risk of living in poverty and a decrease in living standards. In this paper, we expand a framework of equality budgeting, previously applied from a gender perspective, to the population of households affected by...

The relationship between health and employment status continually shows that individuals who work have lower levels of illness and higher self-reported health. This study examines how self-reported health and objective measures of health (multimorbidity and mental health problems) differ across...

Ireland is an outlier among EU countries as it does not have a strong link between previous earnings and the level of payment provided to those who have recently lost their job or are on leave from work for the short- to medium-term for reasons of illness or maternity. This paper provides a...