Luis Ayala, Elena Bárcena-Martín, and ICePP director Jorge Martinez-Vazquez have released a paper called “The Distributional Effects of Devolution in the U.S. Welfare Reform.” In it, they estimate the effects of devolved welfare programs using TANF data covering the two decades after the PRWORA’s enactment. They measure the contribution of each state to inequality in adequacy rates and provide an interpretation of the decomposition of the change in inequality in adequacy rates in terms of progressivity and re-ranking components, including analysis of the convergence in TANF adequacy rates. They also estimate the conditional convergence of adequacy ratios with respect to the change in labor participation, poverty rates, and caseloads, and find that differences in adequacy rates increased and that a downward divergence path took place ensuing devolution of welfare reform in the U.S.
Read the full working paper here.
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The International Center for Public Policy has published a working paper series since 1997 to disseminate academic research quickly and to stimulate discussion that can expand knowledge, instill optimal practice and build capacity in the public sector around the world to improve human well-being.
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