IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/wly/amposc/v59y2015i3p565-577.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Political Reinforcement: How Rising Inequality Curbs Manifested Welfare Generosity

Author

Listed:
  • Erling Barth
  • Henning Finseraas
  • Karl O. Moene

Abstract

We propose a political reinforcement hypothesis, suggesting that rising inequality moves party politics on welfare state issues to the right, strengthening rather than modifying the impact of inequality. We model policy platforms by incorporating ideology and opportunism of party members and interests and sympathies of voters. If welfare spending is a normal good within income classes, a majority of voters moves rightward when inequality increases. As a response, the left, in particular, shift their welfare policy platform toward less generosity. We find support for our arguments using data on the welfare policy platforms of political parties in 22 OECD countries.

Suggested Citation

  • Erling Barth & Henning Finseraas & Karl O. Moene, 2015. "Political Reinforcement: How Rising Inequality Curbs Manifested Welfare Generosity," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 59(3), pages 565-577, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:wly:amposc:v:59:y:2015:i:3:p:565-577
    DOI: 10.1111/ajps.12129
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/ajps.12129
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/ajps.12129?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. LIM, Taejun & KIM, Aram, 2023. "How Progressive Is the Most Popular Tax Scheme? The Case of South Korea," Hitotsubashi Journal of Economics, Hitotsubashi University, vol. 64(1), pages 1-17, June.
    2. Roberto Iacono, 2018. "The Nordic Model of Economic Development and Welfare: Recent Developments and Future Prospects," Intereconomics: Review of European Economic Policy, Springer;ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics;Centre for European Policy Studies (CEPS), vol. 53(4), pages 185-190, July.
    3. Apoorva Lal & Mac Lockhart & Yiqing Xu & Ziwen Zu, 2023. "How Much Should We Trust Instrumental Variable Estimates in Political Science? Practical Advice Based on Over 60 Replicated Studies," Papers 2303.11399, arXiv.org, revised Nov 2023.
    4. Frédéric Cherbonnier & Christian Gollier, 2022. "Risk-adjusted Social Discount Rates," Post-Print hal-04012977, HAL.
    5. Peter John, 2018. "Theories of policy change and variation reconsidered: a prospectus for the political economy of public policy," Policy Sciences, Springer;Society of Policy Sciences, vol. 51(1), pages 1-16, March.
    6. Boarini, Romina & Causa, Orsetta & Fleurbaey, Marc & Grimalda, Gianluca & Woolard, Ingrid, 2018. "Reducing inequalities and strengthening social cohesion through inclusive growth: A roadmap for action," Economics - The Open-Access, Open-Assessment E-Journal (2007-2020), Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel), vol. 12, pages 1-26.
    7. Erik Bengtsson, 2014. "Labour's share in twentieth-century Sweden: a reinterpretation," Scandinavian Economic History Review, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 62(3), pages 290-314, November.
    8. Roberto Iacono, 2019. "The Norwegian Oil Bonanza and the Scandinavian Model in Comparative Perspective," Comparative Economic Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Association for Comparative Economic Studies, vol. 61(1), pages 63-82, March.
    9. Stiglitz, Joseph E., 2015. "Leaders and followers: Perspectives on the Nordic model and the economics of innovation," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 127(C), pages 3-16.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:wly:amposc:v:59:y:2015:i:3:p:565-577. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://doi.org/10.1111/(ISSN)1540-5907 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.