The new Labour Government in Britain has made the reduction of childpoverty one of its central objectives. This paper describes the specificinitiatives involved in Labour’s approach and weighs them up in termsof their potential impact. After setting out the extent of the problem ofchild...

The paper analyses changes in poverty in Britain since 1997. A povertylevel of 60 percent of median equivalised income is used. The first partexamines the changes that occurred between 1996/7 and 2000/1 asshown by the Family Resources Survey, on which government estimatesof Households Below...

This paper quantifies the economic well-being of different age groups and the extent of their reliance on incomes from public and private sources. The aim is to establish how social benefits, and the taxes needed to finance them, affect income levels and disparities across different age groups....

As unemployment rises across the European Union (EU) it is important to understand the extent to which the incomes of the new unemployed are protected by tax-benefit systems and to assess the cost pressures on the governments. This paper uses the EU tax-benefit model EUROMOD to explore these...

We argue that independent entitlement to income is important. This implies that earnings replacement benefits paid to individuals fulfil a range of functions which means-tested benefits, assessed at the family rather than individual level, cannot. The argument also highlights the need to...

As unemployment rises across the European Union (EU) it is important to understand the extent to which the incomes of the new unemployed are protected by tax-benefit systems and to assess the cost pressures on the governments. This paper uses the EU tax-benefit model EUROMOD to explore these...

We argue that independent entitlement to income is important. This implies that earnings replacement benefits paid to individuals fulfil a range of functions which means-tested benefits, assessed at the family rather than individual level, cannot. The argument also highlights the need to...