The federal Conservative government recently began phasing in a plan to raise the age of eligibility for Old Age Security from 65 to 67. But a more sensible move for improving the effectiveness of Canada’s social safety-net system may be to actually lower the age below 65 and rely strictly on...

Recent macroeconomic trends primarily but not exclusively in Europe suggest that the welfare state is not conducive to growth and prosperity. European welfare-state economies have experienced a long-term decline in GDP growth, private consumption and domestic absorption; and a long-term increase...

In the context of continuing adjustments in the economy, the Government of Indonesia proposes to bring energy prices closer to long run marginal cost, while adequately compensating the poor. We focus on the constraints on central government policy objectives towards the poor as decentralization...

In recent years, policymaking in China has put increasing emphasis on stemming the growth in inequality, which had been fairly steep since the 1980s. Policy action has taken the form of regional development measures and of reforms of various aspects of the social safety net broadly defined. The...

Poverty has remained widespread in Mozambique, mostly on account of the prevalent war situation. This paper provides a profile of the lowest income groups in Mozambique and examines how they were affected by the economic recovery program of 1986-90. The results, indicate that despite large price...

This paper applies, through a case study on Malawi, a simple methodology indicating the first-round (i.e., price) effects of macroeconomic policies on real earnings of the poor. As the economic program in Malawi has not involved substantial exchange rate action or cuts in subsidies, the real...

This Connecticut Poverty Report describes the change in the number and proportion of Connecticut residents living in poverty, and the increase in both number and percent between 1990 and 2010, based on Census Bureau reports. Demographic measures of age, race,family structure, education and job...

Macroeconometric policy simulation models allow for an analysis, and, above all, for a quantification of the effects different economic policies have on the various variables that represent the economy. Despite the seminal "Lucas critique" levelled against them, these models are still widely...

In mid-April 2013, the Secretariat of the World Trade Organization (WTO) published an annual analytical review on the basis of the results of development of the international trade in 2012 and the prospects of its development in 2013. The above document includes as well the initial statistical...

Income disparities by race are large and persistent in the U.S., and shifts in economic cycles often exacerbate these inequalities. Recent cycles, such as the pandemic-induced recession, offer a glimpse into how a tight labor market and targeted fiscal supports can boost broad-based economic...