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Decentralizing Eligibility for a Federal Antipoverty Program: A Case Study for China

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  • Martin Ravallion

Abstract

In theory, the informational advantage of decentralizing the eligibility criteria for a federal antipoverty program could come at a large cost to the program's performance in reaching the poor nationally. Whether this happens in practice depends on the size of the local-income effect on the eligibility cutoffs. China's Di Bao program provides a case study. Poorer municipalities adopt systematically lower thresholds--roughly negating intercity differences in need for the program and generating considerable horizontal inequity, so that poor families in rich cities fare better. The income effect is not strong enough to undermine the program's overall poverty impact; other factors, including incomplete coverage of those eligible, appear to matter more. Copyright The Author 2009. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development / the world bank . All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org, Oxford University Press.

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  • Martin Ravallion, 0. "Decentralizing Eligibility for a Federal Antipoverty Program: A Case Study for China," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 23(1), pages 1-30.
    • Handle: RePEc:oup:wbecrv:v:23:y::i:1:p:1-30
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    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/wber/lhn023
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    Cited by:

    1. Mehta, Aashish & Jha, Shikha & Quising, Pilipinas, 2013. "Self-targeted food subsidies and voice: Evidence from the Philippines," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 204-217.
    2. Mogues, Tewodaj & Erman, Alvina, 2016. "Institutional arrangements to make public spending responsive to the poor—(where) have they worked?: Review of the evidence on four major intervention types," IFPRI discussion papers 1519, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
    3. repec:dau:papers:123456789/4713 is not listed on IDEAS
    4. Martin Ravallion, 2011. "A Comparative Perspective on Poverty Reduction in Brazil, China, and India," The World Bank Research Observer, World Bank, vol. 26(1), pages 71-104, February.
    5. Kochar, Anjini & Singh, Kesar & Singh, Sukhwinder, 2009. "Targeting public goods to the poor in a segregated economy: An empirical analysis of central mandates in rural India," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 93(7-8), pages 917-930, August.
    6. Zhiming Cheng, 2014. "Layoffs and Urban Poverty in the State-Owned Enterprise Communities in Shaanxi Province, China," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 116(1), pages 199-233, March.
    7. Ravallion, Martin & Chen, Shaohua, 2015. "Benefit incidence with incentive effects, measurement errors and latent heterogeneity: A case study for China," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 128(C), pages 124-132.

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