Abstract: Social scientists identify two core functions of modern welfare states as redistribution across (a) socio-economic status groups (Robin Hood) and (b) ’the lifecycle’ (the piggy bank). But what is the relative importance of these functions? The answer has been elusive, as the piggy bank is metaphorical. The intra-personal time-travel of resources it implies is based on non-quid-pro-quo transfers. In practice, ‘lifecycle redistribution’ must operate through inter-age-group resource reallocation in cross-section. Since at any time different birth cohorts live together, ’resource-productive’ working-aged people are taxed to finance consumption of ’resource-dependent’ younger and older people. In a novel analysis of the joint distribution of socio-economic status and age, we decompose their effects on (a) all cash and in-kind transfers (‘benefits’), (b) financing contributions (‘taxes’), and (c) resulting ‘net benefits,’ on a sample of over 400,000 Europeans from 22 countries. European welfare states, often maligned as ineffective Robin Hood vehicles riddled with Matthew effects, are better characterized as inter-age redistribution machines performing a more important second task rather well: lifecycle consumption smoothing. Social policies are neither primarily nor solely responsible for poverty relief and inequality reduction.
The Covid-19 pandemic, as well as the mounting pressures of population ageing are forcing welfare states around the globe to reckon with the difficulties of meeting health- and social care needs in ways that are both sustainable and compatible with gender justice and justice between the young and the old.
The CPop/ DaWS Interdisciplinary Lecture Series on Care and Intergenerational Justice are organized by the Societies and Demographic Change section at the Danish Centre for Welfare Studies and the Interdisciplinary Centre on Population Dynamics at the University of Southern Denmark. They bring together world-leading researchers to discuss new ways of understanding and addressing the challenges of implementing just care systems.
For additional information and information about registration please contact Lars Henrik Pedersen.