@article{Kuhn:253395,
      recid = {253395},
      author = {Kuhn, Lena and Brosig, Stephan and Zhang, Linxiu},
      title = {Social transfers in rural China: Do they contribute to  poverty reduction?},
      address = {2017},
      number = {919-2016-72781},
      series = {IAMO Policy Brief},
      pages = {4},
      year = {2017},
      abstract = {In order to combat absolute poverty in rural China, the  “Rural
Minimum Living Standard System” was launched  nationally in
2007. The program provides direct monetary  transfers to rural
households living below the poverty  line. A recent research project
working with a sample of  around 5000 households found
that monetary transfers were  being misallocated to a considerable
extent, which greatly  reduced the effectiveness of the program:
89 percent of the  recipient households were not eligible
according to their  (reported) income while 79 percent of households
assessed  to be eligible according to their reported income
were  unable to receive the necessary assistance. Qualitative  investigations
revealed that these misallocations were  often
caused by a lack of human resources among local  administrations
within structurally weak regions.  Additional financial aid
provided by the central government  towards the cost of the program's
implementation could lead  to considerable improvement
in targeting, i.e. the  identification of households eligible to receive
transfers.  However, due to an inability to accurately measure
and  document income, the implementation of a closely  supervised
system such as those found in central Europe  does not
appear to be suitable in the near future. In the  mid-term, a step
by step replacement of social transfers  with health and pension
benefits should be discussed in  order to alleviate the high administrative
cost engendered  by targeting based on income.},
      url = {http://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/253395},
      doi = {https://doi.org/10.22004/ag.econ.253395},
}