​This is the first book that performs international and intertemporal comparisons of uniform tax progression with empirical data. While conventional measures of tax progression suffer from serious disadvantages for empirical analyses, this book extends uniform measures to progression comparisons of countries with different income distributions. Tax progression is analyzed in terms of Lorenz curve and Suits curve equivalents of net incomes and taxes. The authors derive six distinct definitions of the relation "is more progressive than", which are then utilized for an empirical analysis of 13 countries included in the Luxembourg Income Study (LIS). In two thirds of all international comparisons of tax progression, the authors report a clear ranking of the respective countries in terms of progression dominance. Tax based definitions of greater progressivity perform best. These observations are yet reinforced by statistical tests. The book also provides an account of the institutional background of the involved countries in order to facilitate the interpretation of the data. Moreover, the authors conduct intertemporal comparisons of tax progression for selected countries and perform a sensitivity analysis with respect to the parameterization of the equivalence scale.

On October 24th, 1994, the pro-government German newspaper 'Die Welt' reported that the Minister of Family Affairs, Mrs. Hannelore Ransch, member of the ruling Christian Democratic Union (CD U), withdrew her candidacy for a second term after serving a four year term. While Chancellor Helmut Kohl and other party colleagues officially expressed their regret for this move, the conservative press openly announced their relief. A symbolic photo of Ransch was published together with the article: In the background, two direction indicators are discernable, one pointing to the 'emergency exit' and the other to the 'escape route'. What led up to this state of affairs? Some months before, Ransch had triggered off a storm of public indignation due to her proposal to partly re place the present German child-benefit system by 'tax fines for the childless'. To be exact, the minister's idea was to distinctly increase child allowance and child benefit, and to bill childless families for this measure, that is, childless couples and singles should have to payoff a tax surcharge christened 'Zu kunftsbeitrag' (,contribution to the future'). However, only the second part of her proposal, the tax fine, made it to the headlines (compare, for exam ple, 'Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung', February 19th, 1994, and 'Die Welt', March 28th, 1994).

This book focuses on the political economy of privatization, and addresses the questions 'What are the driving forces behind this development and how can the variation be explained?' which are of both theoretical and empirical interest. The volume addresses the political economy of privatization in advanced democracies in the last 30 years.

In der OECD-Welt wird etwa ein Viertel des gesamten Bruttoinlandsprodukts und knapp die Hälfte der Staatsausgaben für den Sozialstaat, also die Sicherung gegen zentrale Lebensrisiken, verwendet. Deutschland gehört dabei zur Spitzengruppe, widmet dem jedoch kaum Forschungsenergien. Die Leistungen des Sozialstaats sind für eine immer größer werdende Zahl von Menschen überlebenswichtig und seine Reformen prägen heute den politischen Alltag. Angesichts seiner vielfältigen Herausforderungen – etwa durch den Wandel der Bildungs- und Arbeitswelt sowie der Familienstrukturen und durch massive demographische Veränderungen – muss dem Sozialstaat künftig nachhaltig größere Aufmerksamkeit in Wissenschaft und Forschung gelten. Andernfalls wird »Sozialpolitik im Blindflug« normal und Sicherungserfolg zufällig. In dieser Denkschrift werden die anstehenden Herausforderungen bilanziert und auf breiter Front neue Perspektiven für eine thematische und analytische Neuausrichtung der Sozialpolitikforschung vorgeschlagen.

This book explores the foundations and potential of a theory of need-based distributive justice, supported by experimental evidence. The core idea is that need-based distributive justice may have some legitimatory advantages over other important principles of distribution, like equality and equity, and therefore involves less dispute over the distribution and redistribution of scarce resources. In seven chapters, eleven scholars from the fields of philosophy, psychology, sociology, political science and economics outline the normative and positive building blocks of such a theory by critically reviewing the literature on distributive justice from their respective disciplinary perspectives. They address important theoretical and practical issues concerning the rationality of needs identification at the individual level and the recognition of needs at the societal level. They also investigate whether and how the dynamics of distribution procedures that allocate resources according to the need principle leads to social stability, focusing on the economic incentives that arise from need-based redistribution. The final chapter provides a synthesis and outlines a framework for a theory of justice based on ten hypotheses derived from the insights presented.