Publications

2022
Working Paper

Social Protection and Social Distancing During the Pandemic: Mobile Money Transfers in Ghana

By: Dean Karlan, Matt Lowe, Robert Osei, Isaac Osei-Akoto, Benjamin N. Roth and Christopher Udry

We study the impact of mobile money transfers to a representative sample of low-income Ghanaians during the COVID-19 pandemic. The announcement of the upcoming transfers affects neither consumption, well-being, nor social distancing. Once disbursed,... View Details

Keywords: Social Distancing; Social Welfare; Economic Relief; Health Pandemics; Poverty

February 2011
Article

Welfare Payments and Crime

By: C. Fritz Foley

Analysis of daily reported incidents of major crimes in twelve U.S. cities reveals an increase in crime over the course of monthly welfare payment cycles. This increase reflects an increase in crimes that are likely to have a direct financial motivation like burglary,... View Details

Keywords: Crime and Corruption; Motivation and Incentives; Welfare; United States

SSRN

2008
Working Paper

Welfare Payments and Crime

By: C. Fritz Foley

This paper tests the hypothesis that the timing of welfare payments affects criminal activity. Analysis of daily reported incidents of major crimes in twelve U.S. cities reveals an increase in crime over the course of monthly welfare payment cycles. This increase... View Details

Keywords: Crime and Corruption; Motivation and Incentives; Welfare; United States

SSRN

March 2009 (Revised June 2012)
Case

Denmark: Globalization and the Welfare State

By: Arthur A. Daemmrich and Benjamin Kramarz

This case describes how Denmark has balanced the impacts of globalization, including outsourcing and movement of labor, with its social welfare offerings. Reforms implemented during the past two decades drove down unemployment, promoted new company formation, and put... View Details

Keywords: Macroeconomics; Trade; Globalized Economies and Regions; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Job Cuts and Outsourcing; Employment; Welfare or Wellbeing; Denmark

Educators

June 2022 (Revised November 2022)
Case

The Almost Nearly Perfect People: Sweden's Utopia at a Crossroads

By: Debora L. Spar and Julia M. Comeau

Sweden’s model of capitalism rests on a unique social contract, in which social welfare priorities can co-exist within a vibrant capitalist system. In 2022, however, contemporary pressures were growing on the traditional Swedish model, including mounting calls for... View Details

Keywords: Capitalism; Social Welfare; Policy; Privatization; Immigration; Social Issues; Civil Society or Community; Government and Politics; Sweden

Educators

2021
Article

Fair Influence Maximization: A Welfare Optimization Approach

By: Aida Rahmattalabi, Shahin Jabbari, Himabindu Lakkaraju, Phebe Vayanos, Max Izenberg, Ryan Brown, Eric Rice and Milind Tambe

Several behavioral, social, and public health interventions, such as suicide/HIV prevention or community preparedness against natural disasters, leverage social network information to maximize outreach. Algorithmic influence maximization techniques have been proposed... View Details

1999
Working Paper

Business Groups and Social Welfare in Emerging Markets: Existing Evidence & Unanswered Questions

By: Tarun Khanna

May 2000
Article

Business Groups and Social Welfare in Emerging Markets: Existing Evidence and Unanswered Questions

By: T. Khanna

Keywords: Groups and Teams; Welfare; Markets

2013
Chapter

The Welfare State as an Investment Strategy: Denmark’s Flexicurity Policies

By: Arthur Daemmrich and Thomas Bredgaard

This chapter examines how the welfare state can serve as a national strategy to invest in economic competitiveness and sustainable national prosperity, as well as the significant challenges associated with operating an open economy in a period of increased labor... View Details

Keywords: Open Economy; Welfare; Competitive Advantage; Economic Growth; Human Capital; Government and Politics; Denmark

Article

Credit Access and Social Welfare: The Rise of Consumer Lending in the United States and France

By: Gunnar Trumbull

Research into the causes of the 2008 financial crisis has drawn attention to a link between growing income inequality in the United States and high household indebtedness. Most accounts trace the U.S. idea of credit-as-welfare to the period of wage stagnation and... View Details

Keywords: Household Finance; Welfare State; Credit; Personal Finance; Welfare; Borrowing and Debt; France; United States

07 Apr 2014
News

Idea to overhaul social welfare assistance with guaranteed income spurs debate and diverse support

Article

Informal Family Insurance and the Design of the Welfare State

By: Rafael Di Tella and Robert MacCulloch

We study unemployment benefit provision when the family also provides social insurance. In the benchmark case, more generous State transfers crowd out family risk-sharing one-for-one. An extension gives the State an advantage in enforcing transfers through taxes... View Details

Keywords: Insurance; Design; Welfare

2014
Book

Consumer Lending in France and America: Credit and Welfare

By: Gunnar Trumbull

Why did America embrace consumer credit over the course of the twentieth century, when most other countries did not? How did American policy makers by the late twentieth century come to believe that more credit would make even poor families better off? This book traces... View Details

Keywords: Attitudes; Credit; France; United States

September – October 1982
Article

Can Industry Survive the Welfare State?

By: Bruce R. Scott

Keywords: Business Ventures; Social Issues

1998
Working Paper

Some Evidence on the Optimal Welfare State Based on Subjective Data

By: Rafael Di Tella and Robert MacCulloch

It is often difficult to evaluate all the costs and benefits of the welfare state. This paper suggests an alternative approach based on surveys of citizen satisfaction with welfare programs. In the first part of the paper we estimate the level of unemployment benefits... View Details

Keywords: Personal Characteristics; Employment; Surveys; Programs; Government and Politics; Age; Income; Residency; Welfare; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Cost vs Benefits; Satisfaction; United Kingdom

April 2025
Article

The Allocation of Socially Responsible Capital

By: Daniel Green and Benjamin N. Roth

Portfolio allocation decisions increasingly incorporate social values. We develop a tractable framework to study how competition between investors to own socially valuable assets affects social welfare. Relative to the most common social-investing strategies, we... View Details

Keywords: Socially Responsible Investing; Investment Portfolio; Welfare; Social Issues; Investment Return

April 2012
Article

Proposing a Welfare Framework for the Society and Local Community Stakeholders: A Mixed Method Study

By: Shashank Shah

Keywords: Corporate Social Responsibility; Community Engagement; Philanthropy; India

October 2002 (Revised November 2002)
Case

Welfare State and its Impact on Business Competitiveness, The: Sweden Inc. for Sale?

By: Huw Pill, Petter Johnsson, Ola Nordquist and Ingrid Vogel

The Swedish Model--sometimes presented as a third way between savage capitalism and unrealistic socialism--was much lauded in the 1960s. It was viewed as a strategy that addressed social concerns while supporting economic growth. However, the financial and currency... View Details

Keywords: Economic Systems; Welfare; Government and Politics; Taxation; Competition; Public Administration Industry; Sweden

Educators

2007
Working Paper

Proprietary vs. Open Two-Sided Platforms and Social Efficiency

By: Andrei Hagiu

This paper identifies a fundamental economic welfare tradeoff between two-sided open platforms and two-sided proprietary (closed) platforms connecting consumers and producers. Proprietary platforms create two-sided deadweight losses through monopoly pricing but at the... View Details

Keywords: Two-Sided Markets; Platforms; Indirect Network Effects; Product Variety; Social Efficiency; Two-Sided Platforms; Network Effects; Welfare or Wellbeing