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This paper reflects on the functioning and shortcomings of the Food-For-Work (FFW) program in the Indian State of Andhra Pradesh. Drawing upon 12 months of primary field research conducted in 2001-02, it shows how design faults, administrative mismanagement, and local power relations excluded very poor and lower caste people from participating in the program. The main problem areas were ineffective village assemblies (Gram Sabhas), the engagement of 'contractors,' the selection of beneficiaries by contractors, inappropriate wage setting, payments in cash instead of grain, the use of labor-displacing machinery, and disregard of the labor:material ratio in works executed. The paper concludes with policy lessons for improving the design and implementation of future FFW programs. Key words--South Asia, Andhra Pradesh, food-for-work, corruption, poverty

This paper tests for the motives for private income transfers. We consider two motives: altruism and exchange. The question of private-transfer motives is important because such motivation can influence the effects of public income transfers on the distribution of income. Using a household survey for Peru, we find that transfer amounts received increase with recipient pre-transfer income, which contradicts a key prediction of the strong form of the altruism hypothesis but is consistent with exchange. We also find that capital market imperfections are likely to be an important cause of private transfers and that social security benefits 'crowd out' the incidence of private transfers. JEL classification: O15; O16; J14; I30; H55 Keywords: Intergenerational transfers; Liquidity constraints; Social security; Developing economies; Altruism; Bargaining

Previous research generally concludes that early participants in the Social Security system received a very good 'deal'--better than later participants received, and much better than future participants are likely to get. However, researchers do not know the values of those deals and their distribution across individuals and groups largely because the necessary data have not been available. The study here uses the Social Security Administration's 1988 Continuous Work History Sample (CWHS) to calculate early participants' real internal rates of return to contributions. The study analyzes sex, race, household type, income, and birth cohorts and employs new Census Bureau mortality projects to forecast more accurately how life expectancies and benefit streams vary by race as well as by sex and birth cohort. Results contribute to an understanding of how the Social Security system redistributes income. All sample groups received high real rates of return. However, the returns varied widely by household type, income level, birth cohort, and other factors. The authors calculate that persons born from 1895 to 1922 received a total transfer of $3.5 trillion, of which $1.3 trillion remained to be paid as of 1988., I. INTRODUCTION The combined benefit and contribution structure of the U.S. Social Security program generates substantial income transfers within and across generations. A highly progressive benefit formula transfers income from [...]

The UK government will decrease the number of hours which individuals must work to obtain family credit (FC) from 24 hours to 16 hours a week to increase the range of jobs available, living standards and the labour market. Family credit is given to families with children whose earnings are low. There were 313,000 families receiving FC during 1990, 40% of which were single parents. The study uses the Simulation Program for the Analysis of Incentives to calculate the labour supply responses of single parents and the effects the reform will have on them. It is estimated that up to 40,000 will return to work.

This paper reviews recent research on take-up with a view to identifying the most promising lines of further enquiry. In the late 1970s take-up research seemed to be foundering in the face of the complexity of the factors affecting claiming decisions. Progress came via the development of modes of the claiming process. The most influential postulated a series of thresholds which claimants must pass in a set sequence of the way to claiming a benefit. One question for future research is whether this model is still the best starting point or whether there are others which capture the key factors and their interaction more fully and accurately. Another approach is to look at claiming decisions indirectly by applying multivariate techniques to continuous survey data to examine the relationship between variables such as age, income and housing tenure and differing probabilities of claiming. A second question is what the two approaches can offer each other. Overhanging all the issues facing take-up research is the problem of sampling a population--eligible non-recipients--for which, almost by definition, no suitable sampling frame exists. The paper concludes by examining various options for identifying this elusive group.

A study investigated the dynamic allocation of resources and consumption in an altruistic economy where people live two periods and pairs of generations live in the same period. The altruism is intergenerational, extends to both child and parent generations and is non-paternalistic. The object of the study was to address the issue of whether or not there exists a social security program which can be maintained successively from one period to another.

HOW CAN THE United States ensure that health and income security programs are adequate for an aging workforce as retirement approaches? What risks do older workers face? What if they [...]