Whither poverty in Great Britain and the United States? The determinants of changing poverty and whether work will work

Dickens, Richard and Ellwood, David T. (2001) Whither poverty in Great Britain and the United States? The determinants of changing poverty and whether work will work. CEPDP (506). London School of Economics and Political Science. Centre for Economic Performance, London, UK. ISBN 0753014947

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Abstract

We provide a comparison of poverty levels in Britain and the US based on a set of common definitions. We then ask what factors û demographic, economic, or policy û account for the observed changes in poverty in the two nations and what role could policy play in reducing poverty? We find that the forces influencing poverty differ between nations and across absolute and relative poverty measures. Demographic and wage change is a dominant force in both nations. Government benefits reduced relative and absolute poverty considerably in Britain over this period but had little impact in the US. However, policy changes may have significantly increased work in the US, particularly among single parents, whereas in Britain they may have had the reverse effect. The UK government has committed itself to reducing child poverty by half over the next 10 years and to its abolition within 20 years. We conclude that any purely work-based strategy, which doesn''t tackle demographics and wage dispersion, may not have a dramatic effect on relative poverty.

Item Type:	Monograph (Discussion Paper)
Official URL:	http://cep.lse.ac.uk
Additional Information:	© 2001 the authors
Divisions:	Centre for Economic Performance
Subjects:	H Social Sciences > HD Industries. Land use. Labor H Social Sciences > HV Social pathology. Social and public welfare. Criminology
Date Deposited:	29 Jul 2008 13:55
Last Modified:	13 Sep 2024 19:44
URI:	http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/20109

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