Is More Targeting Consistent with Less Spending?

Martin Ravallion

International Tax and Public Finance, 1999, vol. 6, issue 3, 419 pages

Abstract: Economists often advise governments to target their spending better when cuts are called for. This paper asks whether that advice is consistent with a political-economy constraint that limits the welfare losses to the non-poor from spending cuts. A simple theoretical model shows that the answer is unclear on a priori grounds, and so will depend on the specifics of program design and financing. A case study for a World Bank-supported social program in Argentina illustrates how cuts can come with worse targeting performance; the allocation to the poor falls faster than that to the non-poor. Some lessons are drawn for how the poor might be better protected from cuts. Copyright Kluwer Academic Publishers 1999

Keywords: targeting; poverty; political-economy; Argentina (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 1999
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (19)

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DOI: 10.1023/A:1008763803499

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