The local structure of the welfare state: Uneven effects of social spending on poverty within countries

Urban Studies ◽  
2014 ◽  
Vol 52 (1) ◽  
pp. 87-102 ◽  
Author(s):  
Merle Zwiers ◽  
Ferry Koster
Keyword(s):  
Welfare State ◽  
Local Structure ◽  
Social Spending ◽  
The Welfare State

Who Loves the Swedish Welfare State? Attitude Trends 1980–2010

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stefan Svallfors
Keyword(s):  
Welfare State ◽  
Willingness To Pay ◽  
Task Performance ◽  
Public Support ◽  
Large Degree ◽  
Social Spending ◽  
Public Organization ◽  
Welfare Policies ◽  
Degree Of Stability ◽  
The Welfare State

Attitudes toward social spending, collective financing, and public organization, willingness to pay taxes, suspicion about welfare abuse, and trust in the task performance of the welfare state show a large degree of stability in Sweden, and where change is registered, it tends to go in the direction of increasing support. More people state their willingness to pay higher taxes for welfare policy purposes; more people want collective financing of welfare policies; and fewer people perceive extensive welfare abuse. Class patterns change so that the salaried and the self-employed become more similar to workers in their attitudes. Hence, no attitudinal corrosive effects from increased marketization of the Swedish welfare state can be detected on public support for welfare policies.

Great Recession, great regression? The welfare state in the twenty-first century

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Celia Lessa Kerstenetzky ◽  
Graciele Pereira Guedes
Keyword(s):  
Welfare State ◽  
Great Recession ◽  
Public Expenditure ◽  
First Century ◽  
Social Spending ◽  
Tax Burden ◽  
Social Investment ◽  
Investment Policies ◽  
Stable Performance ◽  
The Welfare State

Abstract Has the welfare state undergone significant retrenchment in the aftermath of the 2007–08 crackdown? In the literature, two contrasting views can be found. Some commentators argue that expansions that would otherwise be observed during crises have been suffocated due to the imperative of austerity. Other more optimistic assessments see social investment policies as having been experimented with in various places, alongside widespread retrenchment. In this paper, using an Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) database for 35 countries, we check these assessments by examining aggregate figures, such as the evolution—over the 2007–13 period—of social spending and its composition, the participation of social spending in public expenditure, the tax burden and tax composition and welfare state effectiveness. We document expansion in the OECD area alongside stable performance. However, important challenges persist.

War Preparation, Warfare, and the Welfare State in Austria

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Herbert Obinger
Keyword(s):  
Welfare State ◽  
Social Spending ◽  
Strong Impact ◽  
Active Labour Market Policy ◽  
Term Care ◽  
Power Resources ◽  
Active Labour ◽  
Post War ◽  
Distribution Of Power ◽  
The Welfare State

This chapter shows that war preparation and particularly the two world wars have left a strong and lasting imprint on the Austrian welfare state. First, war and war preparation are important factors for understanding the timing of programme adoption. Second, the economic and social repercussions of war strongly affected the public–private mix and financing mode of the welfare state. Third, welfare provision to the victims of wars had a strong impact on the social spending/GDP ratio that only gradually petered out. Fourth, social provision for the victims of war was a harbinger of modern social policies as it informed innovations in (civilian) disability policies, active labour market policy, and long-term care. Finally, war drastically altered the political context in a way that has allowed the welfare state to flourish in the post-war period (via e.g. democratization, a changed distribution of power resources, corporatism and consensus democracy, and centralization of government).

Social Expenditure and Welfare State Financing

2021 ◽  
pp. 452-472
Author(s):  
Herbert Obinger
Keyword(s):  
Welfare State ◽  
Social Spending ◽  
Social Expenditure ◽  
National Differences ◽  
Welfare State Development ◽  
State Financing ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Western Democracies ◽  
Cross National ◽  
The Welfare State

This chapter focuses on both the expenditures and the revenues of the welfare state. Using the latest data available, it depicts and analyses major developments in social spending and public revenues in twenty-one advanced Western democracies since 1980. The entry discusses measurement issues, depicts the determinants of cross-national differences in spending and revenue levels identified in the literature, and sheds light on the impact of social spending and taxation on social outcomes, such as income inequality. It is argued that spending and revenue figures, irrespective of several shortcomings, provide important indicators of both the logic and pattern of welfare state development.

scholarly journals Welfare-State Retrenchment Revisited: Entitlement Cuts, Public Sector Restructuring, and Inegalitarian Trends in Advanced Capitalist Societies

1998 ◽  
Vol 51 (1) ◽  
pp. 67-98 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Clayton ◽  
Jonas Pontusson
Keyword(s):  
Public Sector ◽  
Welfare State ◽  
Oecd Countries ◽  
Welfare States ◽  
Social Spending ◽  
Welfare Programs ◽  
Political Consequences ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Welfare State ◽  
Advanced Capitalist

In recent years it has become commonplace for comparativists to emphasize the resilience of welfare states in advanced capitalist societies and the failure of neoliberal efforts to dismantle the welfare state. Challenging some tenets of the resilience thesis, this article seeks to broaden the discussion of welfare-state retrenchment. The authors argue that a sharp deceleration of social spending has occurred in most OECD countries since 1980, that welfare states have failed to offset the rise of market-generated inequality and insecurity, and that welfare programs have become less universalistic. They stress the distributive and political consequences of market-oriented reforms of the public sector.

Fact or fiction? Welfare cuts and fiscal adjustments

2013 ◽  
Vol 34 (1) ◽  
pp. 63-92 ◽  
Author(s):  
Georg Wenzelburger
Keyword(s):  
Economic Growth ◽  
Welfare State ◽  
Public Debt ◽  
Social Spending ◽  
Public Finances ◽  
Long Run ◽  
Fiscal Adjustments ◽  
Social Expenditures ◽  
Western Democracies ◽  
The Welfare State

AbstractGovernments in the industrialised western democracies have repeatedly been advised to curb the welfare state when adjusting public finances in order to stabilise public debt in the long run and to create economic growth. This recommendation has been founded on a vast body of research on fiscal adjustments, which has come to the conclusion that cutting social expenditures leads to expansionary and more sustainable budget consolidations. This paper adds to the existing literature suggesting a more nuanced view, which challenges the simplicity of the “cutting-welfare” advice: first, we find that whereas less social spending is indeed associated with expansionary and successful adjustments, this is not the case for overall welfare state generosity. Second, disaggregating the welfare state in its components reveals that a reduction of pension generosity is indeed related to successful adjustments whereas reducing unemployment generosity does not seem to play a major role.

scholarly journals Challenges of the Welfare State: The Spanish Case

2021 ◽  
Vol 6 (5) ◽  
pp. 7-10
Author(s):  
Miryam de la Concepcion Gonzalez-Rabanal
Keyword(s):  
Welfare State ◽  
Social Services ◽  
Developed Countries ◽  
Social Spending ◽  
Political Debate ◽  
The Public ◽  
Social Contributions ◽  
The One ◽  
Spanish Model ◽  
The Welfare State

Recent events - especially the economic crisis- have revealed the need to maintain the welfare state, especially in developed countries (the most attacked by the crisis) which are also hit the hardest by the recession and job losses. On the one hand, the increase in demand for social services joins the decreased capacity to collect taxes as a result of the fall in economic activity and declining social contributions because of the rising unemployment. On the other, economic difficulties to prop up the welfare of citizens have caused the most unrest and political debate about whether social spending is precisely that what must suffer cuts to balance the public accounts. The answer of each country to this question will depend on its ability to meet new challenges without compromising the future of younger generations. The objective of this paper is to discuss the Spanish model of welfare, taking into special consideration the demographic effects of an aging population and the reversal of migration flows in order to discern which direction and what concrete measures can answer the previous question. This has been a response that in the Spanish case, has highlighted the need to review the excessive benevolence in granting a benefits system and the existing pockets of fraud in the tax system.

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