Why do high-income earners support higher levels of income redistribution in some countries than in others? I argue that differences in the social insurance design have consequences for fairness considerations and that this matters for preference formation. Flat-rate systems provide social benefits in equal amounts to everyone in need, while earnings-related systems provide benefits in relation to previous earnings. In the case of income loss, earnings-related systems maintain unfair income differences, while flat- rate systems equalize unfair income differences between the rich and the poor. Cross-national patterns reveal that support for redistribution among the rich is higher in income-maintaining welfare states. For a strict test of my fairness argument, I conduct a laboratory experiment and show that participants reduce inequality more if given endowment differences are maintained in the case of loss.

Inequality matters for preference formation. We know from previous literature that: (1) it matters most for the rich and less for the poor who always gain from redistribution irrespective of the level of inequality; and (2) perceptions are an important mediator for preference formation. Given that the rich respond more to differences in inequality, we would also expect the effect of perceptions to be most prevalent among the rich. In this paper, we do two things. First, we assess observationally with ISSP data whether income mediates the relationship between perception and preference. We then conduct a survey experiment to explore causal links. We manipulate perceptions by providing pessimistic information on the true level of inequality and update people’s beliefs. We show that information about high levels of inequality makes the poor more homogeneously supportive of redistribution, and that it increases the variation of support for redistribution among the rich. We also show that fairness beliefs matter for the perception-preference link among the rich.

Much work has been done on the gender composition of parliaments but less is know about access and position of female MPs to/in parliamentary committees. These committees exert important policy-making powers in many parliamentary democracies. We show that access to committees is gendered, and women are less likely to become members and chairs of more important committees such as finance or economics. We argue that this gendered access is not merely explainable by factors such as competence, expertise and experience but also due to potential self-selection and discrimination. We propose theoretical and empirical ways to distinguish the two. We test our arguments with unique individual level data on MPs of the German Bundestag and state parliaments since 1948. Our results show that there is gender bias in access and composition of legislative committees that is somewhat mitigated by experience and expertise of MPs. Our results help linking aspects of descriptive representation of women and their ability to influence policy-decisions.

Some political economists argue that who the poor are matters for whether the rich support redistribution. I propose that whether and how social identity influences redistribution preferences depends on the fairness ideal that people endorse. I implement a laboratory study which allows for behavioral heterogeneity across fairness types, and for a distinction between preference-based and information-based identity mechanisms. Results suggest that participants adhere to liberal, parochial/luck egalitarian, and welfare maximizing principles of fairness. Only the parochial/luck egalitarian subgroup reveals ingroup favoritism. The evidence supports a preference-based explanation and suggest that information is important for absolute levels of inequality reduction.

Social insurance models prominently argue that selfish demand for future bene- fits explains support for redistribution among the rich. In this article, I posit that social insurance defines the scope of other-regarding preferences. The welfare state provides benefits to insure against individual exposure to labor market risks. Some welfare states provide social safety nets and benefits are provided in equal amounts to everyone, while in others, benefits are related to previous earnings and stabi- lize individual incomes over the life-cycle. These structural differences define the relative impact of labor market risks on individual income, and consequently, the stability of one’s living status over time. I employ simulated unemployment replacement rates to construct a measure for the governing principle of social insurance and show that average support for redistribution is higher in earnings-related systems. Labor market risk has a stronger impact on redistribution preferences in flat-rate systems. Experimental evidence shows that risky endowments influence transfer shares negatively. Previous social insurance approaches have not taken into account the other-regarding perspective.