Template-type: ReDif-Paper 1.0
Author-Name: Waidler J. 
Author-Name: Hagen-Zanker J.S. 
Author-Name: Gassmann F. 
Author-Name: Siegel M. 
Author-workplace-name: UNU-MERIT
Title: Do remittances and social assistance have different impacts on expenditure patterns of recipient households?: The Moldovan case
Abstract: Do remittances and social assistance have different impacts on household  expenditure patterns While two separate strands of literature have  looked at how social assistance or remittances have been spent, few  studies have compared them directly. Using data from a nationally  representative household survey conducted in Moldova in 2011, this paper  assesses the impact both types of transfers have on household  expenditure patterns. Contrary to the common assumption that money is  fungible, we find that social assistance and remittances have different  impacts on expenditure patterns having controlled for potential  endogeneity. This research highlights that income source matters and  that different incomes may have different poverty impacts. In our  sample, the two types of transfers are received by different, but to  some extent overlapping population groups. The fact that the two  transfers are spent in different ways means that, to some extent, social  assistance and remittances are complements rather than substitutes.
Keywords: Macroeconomics: Consumption; Saving; Wealth; International Migration; Remittances; National Government Expenditures and Related Policies: General; Measurement and Analysis of Poverty; Welfare and Poverty: Government Programs; Provision and Effects of Welfare Programs; Demographic Economics: Public Policy; 
Classification-JEL: F22; F24; J18; I32; I38; E21; H50; .
Series:  Working Papers
Creation-Date: 2014
Number: 072
File-URL: http://pub.maastrichtuniversity.nl/87d49019-8ad5-4108-8a90-a5175591ae2c
File-Format: application/pdf
File-Size: 404304
Handle: RePEc:unm:unumer:2014072