Testing a social safety net

Data covering the period 1987-1989 and dealing with the effect of social policy on poverty in Hungary was evaluated. This undertaking was in line with the intent to find out to what degree social safety nets such as cash benefits could protect people from going below the poverty line or promote people to a higher standard of living. Results showed that such policies merely protected individuals from getting poorer although they did not appreciably extricate them from their present conditions.