Abstract
Economic theory suggests that the extent of redistribution should be constrained by its direct and indirect costs, including disincentive effects. The emphasis in the United States has been on programmes that emphasize employment as well as in-kind rather than cash redistribution, and that provide benefits to populations with special needs. Research on their effects has shown them to decrease poverty rates and the poverty gap but to have labour-supply disincentives as well. Reforms to the main cash programme in the 1990s have increased earnings and employment.
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Moffitt, R.A. (2018). Anti-poverty Programmes in the United States. In: The New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-95189-5_2731
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-95189-5_2731
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