Lomax_Equivalisation Article_Journal of Social Policy_ACCEPTED TEXT.pdf (363.66 kB)
The Minimum Income Standard and equivalisation: reassessing relative costs of singles and couples and of adults and children
journal contribution
posted on 2019-12-19, 14:33 authored by Donald Hirsch, Pierre Concialdi, Antoine Math, Matt PadleyMatt Padley, Elvira Pereira, Jose Pereirinha, Robert ThorntonEquivalence scales, used to compare incomes across household types, strongly influence which households have low reported income, affecting public policy priorities. Yet they draw on abstract, often dated evidence and arbitrary judgements, and on comparisons across the income distribution rather than focusing on minimum requirements. Budget standards provide more tangible comparisons of the minimum required by different household types. The Minimum Income Standard (MIS) method, now established in several countries, applies a common methodological framework for compiling budgets, based on public deliberations. This article draws for the first time on results across countries. In all of the four countries examined, it identifies an under-estimation by the OECD scale of the relative cost of children compared to adults, and in three of the four, an under-estimation of the cost of singles compared to couples. This more systematically corroborates previous, dispersed evidence, and helps explain which specific expenditure categories influence these results. These results have high policy relevance, showing greater proportions of low income households to contain children than standard income distribution data. While no single equivalence scale can be universally accurate, making use of evidence based directly on benchmarks such as MIS can help inform public priorities in tackling low income.
History
School
- Social Sciences and Humanities
Department
- Social and Policy Studies
Published in
Journal of Social PolicyVolume
50Issue
1Pages
148 - 167Publisher
Cambridge University Press (CUP)Version
- AM (Accepted Manuscript)
Rights holder
© Cambridge University PressPublisher statement
This article has been published in a revised form in Journal of Social Policy https://doi.org/10.1017/S0047279419001004. This version is published under a Creative Commons CC-BY-NC-ND. No commercial re-distribution or re-use allowed. Derivative works cannot be distributed. © Cambridge University PressAcceptance date
2019-12-09Publication date
2020-02-04Copyright date
2020ISSN
0047-2794eISSN
1469-7823Publisher version
Language
- en