A Comparison Of Child Benefit Packages In 22 Countries

This is the comprehensively-revised second edition of a volume that was welcomed at its first appearance as 'the most authoritative survey and critique of the welfare state yet published'. Its fifty-one chapters have been written by acknowledged experts in the field from across Europe, Australia, and North America. Some chapters are brand new; all have been systematically revised, and they are right up to date. The first seven sections of the book cover the themes of Ethics, History, Approaches, Inputs and Actors, Policies, Policy Outcomes, and Worlds of Welfare. A final chapter is devoted to the future of welfare and well-being under the imperatives of climate change. Every chapter is written in a way that is both comprehensive and succinct, introducing the novice reader to the essentials of what is going on while providing new insights for the more experienced researcher. Wherever appropriate, the handbook brings the very latest empirical evidence to bear. It is a book that is thoroughly comparative in every way. The Oxford Handbook of the Welfare State, second edition, is a comprehensible and comprehensive survey of everything that it is important to know about the welfare state in these troubled times. It is an indispensable source for everyone who wants to know what is really going on now, and what is likely to happen next.

This book is a comparative study of family change, parental employment and social policy in the five Nordic countries, the Netherlands, Germany and the United Kingdom. In all these countries family forms have been profoundly affected by lower fertility rates, lower marriage rates, increased cohabitation, higher risks of relationship breakdown and episodes of lone parenthood. These changes have also been linked to an increase in the proportion of mothers participating in the labour market.

What are the objectives of social security and social assistance provisions? How can we establish whether these provisions are effective? How do countries differ in the design and effectiveness of their social security systems? This introductory textbook provides a foundation for the systematic study of social security and means-tested social assistance. The book is structured around a model of policy evaluation, which focuses attention on the multiple objectives and outcomes of social security and provides the basis for a multi-disciplinary approach. It progresses from an examination of the varied objectives of social security, via a consideration of key implementation issues, to the establishment of measures of effectiveness and efficiency. Throughout the text theoretical issues are illustrated with reference to the experiences of six countries: the United Kingdom, the USA, Australia, Germany, Sweden and South Korea, to provide an international comparative framework. This is a key textbook for students of social and public policy and economics and essential reading for anyone interested in social security, social welfare and the welfare state.

In this groundbreaking study, Linda Cusworth explores the impact of parental employment or unemployment on the educational and emotional well-being of their children. Using theoretical apparatus from Bourdieu and data from the youth survey of the British Household Panel Study, the research in this book analyzes the impact of parental employment on those born between 1978 and 1990. This study is unique in going beyond the educational achievement and later patterns of employment of the young people studied to look at the whole of children's lives, including their attitudes and aspirations, relationships and emotional well-being. The changed norms of maternal employment and the substantial increase in lone parenthood over the last few decades make this an especially important study both for academics in social and public policy and sociology, and for policy makers.

Adopting an interdisciplinary approach, this Research Handbook examines the shifting global landscape of self-employment. It provides an authoritative overview of key theoretical perspectives and empirical findings in the field, and presents evidence-based policy responses to the multifaceted nature of modern self-employment.

In a volume consisting of nearly 50 newly-written chapters, a broad range of the world's leading scholars offer a comprehensive account of everything one needs to know about the modern welfare state.

Social cohesion is one of the declared objectives of the European Union. This book analyses the EU Social Inclusion Process, the means by which it hopes to meet this objective, and explores the challenges at local, regional, national and EU levels.