Redistribution and Child Poverty: A Cross-National Comparison Between Brazil, Colombia, Panama, Peru, Russia, and South Africa

I propose a disaggregated analysis of the income that households receive to compare the redistributive capacity of the state taking child poverty as case of study. I use the LIS Database and cross-nationally compare six countries: Brazil, Colombia, Panama, Peru, Russia, and South Africa. I created an income package to include a variety of income definitions based on the different sources of income of households: market income, income from private transfers (MI plus PT), and income from government transfers or disposable income. I included these countries because the access to gross income allows to assess in each country to what extent taxes and government transfers reduce the child poverty generated by the market. I use the last three time series available at the LIS for the six countries, which coincide with the period post-crisis 2008: Wave VIII (2010), Wave XIX (2013) and Wave X (2016). I cross-nationally compare the relative child poverty at 40%, 50%, and 60% of the median income for each of the incomes included in the income package for the following ages: 0-17 years old, 0-5 years old, and 6-17 years old, and for the following types of family: biparental and monomarental. I also analyze the Gini coefficient and the relative rate of poverty for the total population.