THE ISSUE OF INCOME REDISTRIBUTION

 
The issue of trade off efficiency and equity, which is represented by income redistribution, becomes
increasingly debated not only in economic and social, but also in political dimension. Solution of
this trade-off is virtually projected into the implementation of social policy and results achieved in
macro economics policy, with the goal to define the optimal scope and character of the income
redistribution processes. The submitted empirical study responds to this problem through the
solution of research question concerning the existence of a relationship between the extent of
selected classes of social protection expenditure (expenditure on policy of family, old age and
unemployment) and the achieved level of economics development, quantified by Human
Development Index (HDI). The existence of this relationship is statistically tested in the sample of
15 countries of the world economy. The research sample is heterogeneous in relation to the
analysed indicators and it concerns countries with a different attained level of economics
development and income redistribution policy. In most surveyed countries, based on the results of
quantitative analysis was confirmed the impact of social protection expenditure on the reached
level of economic development. In the area of family policy and old-age pensions this impact was
positive and in the area of employment policy this impact was negative. A high level of
heterogeneity of selected countries with respect to the observed aspects proves a markedly
different extent and nature of redistribution processes. The findings of the research should
therefore be analysed more deeply through the redistribution theory of defined compromise “trade
off” between efficiency and equity. The compromise in each country depends on the character of
the subparts and the models of social policy. From our perspective, these are models of family
policy (liberal, social-market, universalistic), labour market policy (scandinavian, liberal and
consensual corporate democracy model) and concepts of pension policy (presented by liberal,
socio-democratic and conservative model of social policy). The amount of expenditures of social
protection (on the old age, family policy and unemployment) in selected countries provides basic
outline of tendencies of these expenditures, which differ according to adopted concepts in family
policy, employment policy and policy of the pension system.
The issue of trade off efficiency and equity, which is represented by income redistribution, becomes increasingly debated not only in economic and social, but also in political dimension. Solution of this trade-off is virtually projected into the implementation of social policy and results achieved in macro economics policy, with the goal to define the optimal scope and character of the income redistribution processes. The submitted empirical study responds to this problem through the solution of research question concerning the existence of a relationship between the extent of selected classes of social protection expenditure (expenditure on policy of family, old age and unemployment) and the achieved level of economics development, quantified by Human Development Index (HDI). The existence of this relationship is statistically tested in the sample of 15 countries of the world economy. The research sample is heterogeneous in relation to the analysed indicators and it concerns countries with a different attained level of economics development and income redistribution policy. In most surveyed countries, based on the results of quantitative analysis was confirmed the impact of social protection expenditure on the reached level of economic development. In the area of family policy and old-age pensions this impact was positive and in the area of employment policy this impact was negative. A high level of heterogeneity of selected countries with respect to the observed aspects proves a markety different extent and nature of redistribution processes. The findings of the research should therefore be analysed more deeply through the redistribution theory of defined compromise “trade off” between efficiency and equity. The compromise in each country depends on the character of the subparts and the models of social policy. From our perspective, these are models of family policy (liberal, social-market, universalistic), labour market policy (scandinavian, liberal and consensual corporate democracy model) and concepts of pension policy (presented by liberal, socio-democratic and conservative model of social policy). The amount of expenditures of social protection (on the old age, family policy and unemployment) in selected countries provides basic outline of tendencies of these expenditures, which differ according to adopted concepts in family policy, employment policy and policy of the pension system.