Korpi och Palme om "The Paradox of Redistribution"

The Paradox of Redistribution and Strategies of Equality: Welfare State Institutions,
Inequality, and Poverty in the Western Countries
Author(s): Walter Korpi and Joakim PalmeSource: American Sociological Review, Vol. 63, No. 5 (Oct., 1998), pp. 661-687

Artikeln handlar om hur välfärdsstaten bäst bekämpar ojämlikheten. Det handlar om generella och riktade program, nivån på ersättningarna och om man ska ta in medelklassen eller inte.

s. 663: Because marginal types of social policy programs are directed primarily at those below the poverty line, there is no rational base for a coalition between those above and those below the poverty line. In effect, the poverty line splits the working class and tends to generate coalitions between
better-off workers and the middle class against the lower sections of the working class, something which can result in tax revolts and backlash against the welfare-state.

Personer som förkastar generell välfärdspolitik: Castles och Mitchell (1992), Goodin och Legrand (1987), Gordon Tullock, Brian Barry.

s. 664: Thus, welfare state institutions can be viewed as "intervening variables" (Lazarsfeld 1962), on one hand reflecting causal factors such as actions by coalitions of interest groups, and on the other hand potentially having feedback effects on distributive processes via their effects on the formation of interests, preferences and coalitions among citizens. Therefore a fruitful hy-pothesis is that, while the institutions of the welfare state are to an important extent shaped by different types of interest groups,
once institutions are in place they tend to influence the long-term development of definitions of interests and coalition formation among citizens.

s. 666: (1) Relevant to the issue of targeting versus universalism, the first aspect refers to the definition of bases of entitlement and involves four qualitatively different criteria indicating whether
eligibility is based on need determined via a means test, on contributions (by the insured or employers) to the financing of the social insurance program, on belonging to a specified occupational category, or on citizenship (residence) in the country.7 (2) The second aspect concerns the underlying principle guiding the determination of benefit levels-that is, the extent to which social insurance benefits should replace lost income. The benefit-level principle can be seen as a continuous variable, going from means-tested minimum benefits, to flatrate benefits given equally to everyone, and
to benefits that in different degrees are related to previous earnings. (3) The third aspect is qualitative and refers to the forms for governing a social insurance program. This aspect receives its significance via its combination with the previous two aspects. Here we create a dichotomy based on whether representatives of employers and employees cooperate in the governing of a program.



s. 669:  The encompassing model combines ideas from Bismarck and Beveridge into a new pattern. In this model, eligibility is based on contributions and citizenship. Universal programs covering all citizens and giving them basic security are combined with earningsrelated benefits for the economically active population. This model reduces the demand for private insurance and has the potential of encompassing all citizens within the same program.

Märkligt att de är så fokuserade på socialförsäkringsprogram. Men kanske kan alla tjänster reduceras till basic security/targeted. Får läsa Bergh om detta.

I den empiriska analysen begränsar de sig till ålderspension och sjukersättningarna. De klassificerar länderna enligt sin ovan nämnda typologi.

s. 671: Divergence can be fostered by either institutional structures that directly segment risk pools along socioeconomic lines, or indirectly via redistributive strategies that create differences of interest between the poor and the nonpoor, between workers and salaried employees. The institutions of the corporatist and the voluntary state-subsidized models have direct effects on the segmenting of risk pools. The corporatist model is based on a direct segmentation of risk pools along socioeconomic lines. By creating programs specific to branches of industry and occupational status, corporatist programs separate citizens into relatively homogeneous risk categories that are accorded more or less differing conditions, contributions, and benefits. Thus, this model brings to the fore the potential
lines of socioeconomic cleavages among citizens, creates differences in short-term economic interests among occupational categories, and tends to institutionalize these differences.


s. 672: By discriminating in favor of the poor, the targeted model creates a zero-sum conflict of
interests between the poor and the better-off workers and the middle classes who must pay for the benefits of the poor without receiving any benefits. The targeted model thus tends to drive a wedge between the short-term material interests of the poor and those of the rest of the population, which
must rely on private insurance. It gives the better-off categories no rational basis for including the poor, and leaves the poor to trust in the altruism of the more fortunate.As made explicit by Beveridge (1942), in the basic security model flat-rate benefits are intended only to provide a safety net for the
working class, while the middle classes are expected to safeguard their standards of living through various forms of private insurance. Social insurance systems in the basic security model therefore tend to become a concern primarily for manual workers, while as in the targeted model, private insurance is likely to loom large for salaried employees and other better-off groups. Therefore, the basic security model is also likely to separate the interests of high-income strata from those of workers and the poor.


s. 672: By giving basic security to everybody and by offering clearly earnings-related benefits to all economically active individuals, in contrast to the targeted and basic security models, the encompassing model brings low-income groups and the better-off citizens into the
same institutional structures. Because of its earnings-related benefits, it is likely to reduce the demand for private insurance. Thus, the encompassing model can be expected to have the most favorable outcomes in terms of the formation of cross-class coalitions that include manual workers as well as the middle classes. By providing sufficiently high benefits for high-income groups so as not to
push them to exit, in encompassing institutions the voice of the better-off citizens helps not only  themselves but low-income groups as well (Hirschman 1970).

Det låter egentligen som att man inte ändrar något i medelklassens intresse av privata försäkringar, men att det helt enkelt blir lite för bökigt. Man känner inte att det behövs, och så kan man vinna dessa väljare med andra frågor? Eller handlar det om att de tror att systemet är "nästan" försäkringsmässigt - att de inte vet att det omfördelas till de fattiga? Den "fördel" som det svenska systemet har är då alltså att det till skillnad från det tyska faktiskt omfördelar lite grand. Det borde i så fall vara lika legitimt.

s. 672: This trade-off indicates that it is impossible to maximize both the degree of low-income  targeting and budget size. In so far as welfare state institutions contribute to the pooling of risks and resources and to the formation of coalitions that include the middle classes as well as the working class and the poor, they are likely to affect the size of the redistributive budget.'5 Therefore, encompassing institutions are expected to generate the broadest base of support for welfare state
expansion and the largest budget size.

(Den "paradox" de talar om är egentligen en trade-off, mellan budgetstorlek och andel omfördelning.)

s. 681: The traditional arguments favoring low-income targeting and flat-rate benefits have focused on the distribution of money actually transferred and overlook three basic circumstances. (1) The size of redistributive budgets is not necessarily fixed but tends to depend on the type of welfare state institutions that exist in a country. (2) There tends to be a trade-off between the extent of low-income targeting and the size of redistributive budgets. (3) And because large categories of citizens cannot or are not willing to acquire private earnings-related insurance and because of the socioeconomic selection processes operating, the outcomes of market-dominated distribution tend to be more unequal than the distribution found in earnings-related social insurance programs.

s. 682: Of indirect relevance in this context is the fact that in the countries with encompassing institutions, surveys have shown that universal and encompassing programs receive considerably more support among citizens than do means-tested or income-tested programs (Forma 1996; Kangas 1995; Kangas and Palme 1993; Svallfors 1996).

s. 682: Because of their low ceilings for earnings replacement, targeted programs and basic security programs stimulate program exit among the middle classes and increase the demand for private insurance. From the point of view of equality, the problem with the corporatist model is not
that benefits are earnings-related. The main difference between the corporatist and the encompassing models is that by organizing the economically active citizens into occupationally segmented social insurance programs, the corporatist model highlights socioeconomic distinctions among different
categories of citizens and creates divergent interests among these categories. In contrast, encompassing institutions pool the risks and resources of all citizens and thus create converging definitions of interest.


Resonemangen för inledningsvis utifrån enskilda program, men den empiriska prövningen genomförs snarare genom klassifikation av välfärdssystemen som helhet (dock inte enligt EA, utan encompassing, corporatism, basic security, targeted) och med aggregerade mått som Social Spending och GINI. De har ett "Index of targeting of tranfers" som verkar vara andelen av utgifterna i riktade program (s. 677: "This index takes on negative values when transfers are targeted at individuals with low gross incomes, and takes on positive values when transfers are concentrated on those with higher gross incomes. Values around zero indicate, in  distributive terms, neutral outcomes.") och de har en variabel som heter "size of transfers". De korreleterar också den maximala allmänna pensionen (jämfört med en genomsnittlig produktionsarbetarlön) med hur stor andel av BNP som går till privat pensionssparande.

Detta låter lite märkligt. Vad är det för "exit" hos medelklassen som de talar om? Det borde vara att de röstar bort regeringarna, men då borde de ju säga det. För de kan ju inte bara "skippa" att vara med i ett ersättningsprogram, om de inte är frivilliga vill säga. Och om de inte får höga ersättningar (som i Australien) "måste" de ju ha privata försäkringar.

De talar egentligen inte så mycket om den politiska processsen, om att dessa system har högre stöd. Det nämns bara i förbigående på s. 682. Två möjliga förklaringar: (1) Den universella välfärdsstaten bygger på en bättre princip: det blir inte så mycket diskussion om vem som förtjänar hjälp och inte, utan alla ska ha det. Omfördelningen är en liten detalj som inte upplevs kosta så mycket i det stora hela. Svårare att ifrågasätta hela program. På sin höjd kan man diskutera detaljer. Möjligen viss kortsynthet inbyggt i detta. De skulle kanske ha kunnat få mer om de var economic man. Samtidigt, större riskpool gör det kanske billigare även för folk med ganska höga inkomster. (2) Medelklassen (eller de flesta) tänker på dessa system som helt neutrala, och det är svårt att lära dem att de inte är det.

Kanske kan en delmekanism när det gäller just inkomstojämlikhet vara att obligatoriska system leder in arbetarklassen i institutioner som försäkrar dem mot risker de annars inte hade tänkt på?