Non-Cash Benefits and Poverty in Ireland

Abstract

This paper addresses the question of whether Non-Cash benefits significantly affect the estimated poverty rates. It carefully considers how the benefits could be measured and concluded that there is relatively little change in overall poverty levels when non-cash benefits are valued and included in the estimation procedure. However, since the benefits are strongly targeted towards the elderly rather than towards other groups of welfare recipients, their inclusion does matter in determining the relative poverty status of different groups.