Evaluating the long-term impacts of social assistance programs is usually not possible as pure control groups dissolve into treated ones. This paper makes use of data where the treated and control groups remained mostly unmarred. We examine two types of Pakistani social assistance i.e., lump sum...

Transfer receipt is voluntary and costly, generating “self-targeting” through selective take-up among the eligible. How does self-targeting select on need, and what are its policy implications? We show self-targeting is advantageous in eight U.S. transfers: On average, recipients have lower...

The National Action Plan to end Gender-Based Violence, which recently received official endorsement by the Federal, Provincial, and Territorial Ministers responsible for the Status of Women, identifies a key role for economic security policy. Specifically, the Social Infrastructure and Enabling...

How and to what extent does the optimality of Universal Basic Income (UBI) depend on itstime inconsistency? I address these questions in an incomplete-markets economy by characterizingand solving for the equilibria of a dynamic game between individuals and a benevolentgovernment according to its...

This paper develops and applies a micro-macroeconomic modelling approach to the introduction of a universal basic income in Scotland. With a growing interest in the value of large-scale welfare reforms in the light of persistent inequalities and following COVID0-19, we demonstrate the value of a...

As families earn more taxable income, government benefit entitlements are reduced (or “clawed back”) at various phase-out rates, which reduces their overall cost for governments and ensures that they remain targeted to the intended lower-income families. However, benefit reductions act like...

Securing rights for service users, particularly in taking up their social rights, has long been a goal of the social work profession. However, take-up advocacy is an under-researched and under-theorized practice, and little is known about how social workers engage in it and perceive it. The goal...

This paper presents a theoretical model showing how political mistrust affects people's preferences for Universal Basic Income (UBI) when its implementation involves a reduction in spending for other public services (welfare retrenchment). The model shows that individuals with lower levels of...

How does the expectation that a child will receive government benefits in adulthood affect parental investments in the child’s human capital? Most parents whose children receive Supplemental Security Income (SSI) benefits overestimate the likelihood that their child will receive SSI benefits...