Together with Sarah Marchal, I recently published the paper The measurement of targeting design in complex welfare states: a proposal and empirical applications in Social Indicators Research.

In this article we develop an institutional targeting indicator that captures the policy intention to target towards the poor. Our indicator summarizes policy design into one parameter, and captures the complexity of benefit design in contemporary welfare states in a meaningful way. Drawing on the OECD Benefits and Wages data that capture the rules and legislation of tax benefit systems, we demonstrate different empirical applications for this indicator.