Suchergebnisse

THE WIDE CROSS-COUNTRY DISPARITY IN RATES OF ECONOMIC GROWTH IS THE MOST PUZZLING FEATURE OF THE DEVELOPMENT PROCESS. THIS PAPER DESCRIBES A CLASS OF MODELS IN WHICH THIS HETEROGENEITY IN GROWTH EXPERIENCES CAN BE THE RESULT OF CROSS-COUNTRY DIFFERENCES IN GOVERNMENT POLICY. THESE DIFFERENCES CAN ALSO CREATE INCENTIVES OF LABOR MIGRATION FROM SLOW-GROWING TO FAST-GROWING COUNTRIES. IN THE MODELS CONSIDERED, GROWTH IS ENDOGENOUS DESPITE THE ABSENCE OF INCREASING RETURNS BECAUSE THERE IS A "CORE" OF CAPITAL GOODS THAT CAN BE PRODUCED WITHOUT THE DIRECT OR INDIRECT CONTRIBUTION OF FACTORS THAT CANNOT BE ACCUMULATED, SUCH AS LAND.

ABSTRACTThis paper represents a case study in welfare state expansion. It takes an actor-centered point of view and reconstructs the long process which has ultimately led to a compromise solution to the problem of providing long-term care, especially for the elderly. It describes the previously means-tested arrangement of long-term care provision and its shortcomings. Furthermore, it sketches the different stages through which the political debate on this issue has passed during the last twenty years: from the initial phase of defining the "social problem", to the final stage when the approval of the compromise package became a question of "all or nothing". The analysis of the politics of long-term care insurance reveals that the difficulties of reaching an agreement mainly resulted from the complex decision-making situation. It was in essence a problem of decision-making under conditions of general uncertainty.