Housing Benefit: What the government ought to do – but won't

Radical changes to housing benefit are required in order to stem the £840 million of tax payers money lost annually to fraud and error, and to make the housing market fairer and more responsive to the needs of tenants. Housing benefit should be taken out of the hands of local authorities, and instead paid out by social security offices along with income support. Today's very complicated payment rates, which depend on the tenant's rent level, family circumstances, and the type of property occupied, would be replaced by a uniform benefit for all low paid people. The report's author, Dr Peter King of De Montfort University in Leicester, says that perhaps £350 million in administrative costs and payment errors could be saved by these simplifications alone.

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The Stakeholder Protection Account

With public budgets tight and negative incentives a concern, government is keen to focus its help on the most needy, letting others carry more of their own burden. This may be the start of a third way for welfare, in which individuals themselves are expected to take on more responsibility for insurable risks presently covered by the state. There is wide experience to draw on, both from within the uk and abroad, of how private insurance can take up some of the strain and tailor a better service to today's more diverse population.

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Competition or Regulation? - An Alternative Approach to Investor Protection

In this paper, Simon Read discusses the impact of the introduction of the Financial Services Authority, information and advice, regulation, and competition in the finance market.  

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Simply No Mistake

'Simply No Mistake' outlines "the biggest pensions boost for women and carers since the creation of the welfare state" in which every pound put into a stakeholder pension would be topped up with another pound contributed by the chancellor, up to £20,000 each year. The report suggests that rules on pensions should be streamlined, scrapping limits on contributions and allowing people to save into company and personal plans at the same time.

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Making Welfare Work

Dr Merrill Matthews of the National Center for Policy Analysis explores the lessons of the best and worst US state welfare reform programmes.

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Passbook to Security

This paper describes the main features of the Passbook Pension, its costs and benefits, its relationship to today's personal and occupational pensions, the appropriate tax and regulatory regime, and the speed and costs of introducing the reforms.

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The Passbook Pension: meeting all the objectives for pension reform

This Adam Smith Institute briefing paper addresses the challenges and requirements laid down by Harriet Harman's statement from July 1997 relating to stakeholder pensions. While retaining the guarantees of state provision, it offers people a voluntary, funded, simple alternative to SERPS and the basic pension. Assuring everyone of security and dignity, not dependancy, in retirement.

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The Great Escape

There is growing agreement that our state pension system must be underpinned by proper funding. The only worry about such a reform is the belief that "one generation must pay twice" - once to pay what is due to today's elderly and once more to build up funds for its own retirement. New research shows this fear to be unfounded. The economic gain from a funded system is so large that we could make the transition within a generation and still leave everyone better off.

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Beyond Pension Plus: Developing the fortune account

The future of the welfare state is now firmly at the centre of public debate. Its seeming inability to conquer poverty,despite an annual budget of £100 billion, provokes many to question whether a system designed in the 1940's is up to the challenges of today. The Adam Smith Institute argues that we need a completely different approach - replacing our collectivized state pensions and national insurance scheme with a system of personal lifetime fortune accounts, competitively provided.

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What's Wrong with the Welfare State?

The history of the welfare state is a record of failing attempts to curb the costs of over optimistic promises made by politicians. This early welfare state was, like today's contributory and compulsory; but its benefits were neither comprehensive or universal. As we can see today the financial balance was well out of tilt. This report lays out a solution to the problems.

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