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Wiley InterScience | |||||||
  Fiscal StudiesVolume 25 Issue 3, Pages 305 - 324 Published Online: 14 Mar 2005 © Institute for Fiscal Studies, 2009 Published on behalf of the Institute for Fiscal Studies
Abstract | References | Full Text: PDF (Size: 104K) | Related Articles | Citation Tracking  Targeting Social Assistance Though they should not bear any responsibility for the views expressed here, the author wishes to acknowledge the financial support of the Australian Department of Family and Community Services and comments on previous versions of this paper by Stephen Jenkins, Tim Smeeding, seminar participants in Australia and Italy and two anonymous referees. Copyright Institute for Fiscal Studies, 2004 Abstract
This paper reviews the normative welfare economic literature on income-based targeting and contrasts its assumptions with those underlying current policy discourse. One current policy debate concerns the potential role for Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) income tests. In general, economic models within the standard (for economists) 'welfarist' approach provide little support for such policies. However, much policy discourse is explicitly non-welfarist, placing a negative social value on the leisure or home production of the poor. From this perspective, EITC or workfare-type programmes may be socially optimal. The normative foundations of this policy discourse, however, have yet to be subject to the rigorous analysis that underlies the welfarist approach. | 
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