The Distributional impacts of public policies /

While both the social and the individual cost of poverty and deprivation are recognized by all segments of society, programs to redistribute income have shown cyclical and secular volatility unrelated to need. Whether this is symptomatic of society's will to help or whether it reflects other considerations is difficult to measure, but the recent past has witnessed significant changes in income redistribution programs. Among some of the more important general issues examined in this collection are the problems with official estimates of poverty and the recent trends in poverty incidence. Specific policies like child care, cost-of-living adjustments to social security, and the effects of taxing social security are examined. The book accomplishes two objectives: on the one hand, it carefully and systematically examines the impact of income redistribution programs; on the other, it poses a question concerning the value of such efforts. Until recently research has proceeded along two separate paths. There has arisen as a subset of public finance a considerable literature on the distributional impacts of various fiscal programs. Quite separate from this are theories of decision-making and the policy-making process. Until these two are integrated, it is unlikely systematic improvements in social welfare can be achieved. This book is an important first step in articulating this integration. Upper-division and graduate collections.-J.F. O'Connell, College of the Holy Cross