Description

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In the wake of the global financial crash, there is possibly no more pressing question for social policy than what forms of welfare are affordable and how. Clear and accessible, Howard Glennerster’s Understanding the Cost of Welfare is unique in offering an authoritative, levelheaded, and nontechnical survey of how economic priorities and pressures affect social policies and what the mechanics of funding services mean in real terms. An updated edition of Glennerster’s Understanding the Finance of Welfare, featuring a strengthened comparative dimension in its investigation of these vital services, this book provides more relevant institutional detail than any other text on this topic. Understanding the Cost of Welfare is an important, substantial contribution at a time when neoliberal arguments for reducing the burden of welfare are more dominant than ever before.

About the Author

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Howard Glennerster is professor emeritus of social administration at the London School of Economics and Political Science. He has been an advisor to Her Majesty’s Treasury and to the secretary of state for health on issues of resource allocation.

Praise For…

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"This new edition could not be more timely or policy-relevant as policy makers around the world confront the challenges of adequately funding the welfare state."
— Jane Waldfogel, Columbia University

“Understanding the costs and financing of welfare has rarely been so lively, engaging, and real. Glennerster has produced a text of outstanding scholarship, essential for undergraduate and postgraduate courses right across the social sciences.”
— Chris Deeming, University of Strathclyde

"If we are concerned about the role of welfare in society, we need to understand how it is paid for, and how we might pay for it in the future. Glennerster is the acknowledged expert on these questions and he addresses both in this new edition of his established text, providing critical guidance on current practices and their problems, and outlining the challenges that we will face and how best to respond."
— Pete Alcock, University of Birmingham, emeritus

“This book provides an expert, wide-ranging review of the key evidence and arguments from economics as they relate to social policy. Because economic claims are so fundamental to, and ubiquitous in, the current debates on welfare, it is essential reading for anyone seeking to articulate an informed position on this subject.”
— Jeremy Kendall, University of Kent