Food as a Necessity Good and Food Subsidies.
In this article, we extend a benchmark model to allow for a non‐welfarist social welfare function (SWF) that treats food as a necessity good rather than a regular good, while preserving the assumption that individuals are rational. We show that the widespread use of food subsidies by governments wor...
| Publicado en: | Kyklos Vol. 78; no. 4; pp. 1457 - 1463 |
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| Autor principal: | |
| Formato: | Artículo |
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Wiley-Blackwell
Nov2025
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| Materias: | |
| Acceso en línea: | Ver este registro en EBSCOhost |
| fields | @attributes: recordID: 1 pdfLink: plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=ssf&AN=188481011&site=ehost-live header: @attributes: shortDbName: ssf uiTerm: 188481011 longDbName: Social Sciences Full Text (H.W. Wilson) uiTag: AN controlInfo: bkinfo: jinfo: jid: 00235962 KYK jtl: Kyklos issn: 00235962 maglogo: Y pubinfo: dt: Nov2025 vid: 78 iid: 4 pid: 480 pub: Wiley-Blackwell artinfo: ui: 188481011 10.1111/kykl.70001 ppf: 1457 ppct: 6 formats: fmt: – @attributes: type: T – @attributes: type: P size: 404KB tig: atl: Food as a Necessity Good and Food Subsidies. aug: au: An, Zhiyong affil: World Bank, Washington DC, , USA su: Subsidies Basic needs Income redistribution Public welfare Consumption tax Agricultural subsidies Groceries sug: subj: Subsidies Basic needs Income redistribution Public welfare General-line food merchant wholesalers Emergency and Other Relief Services Other Individual and Family Services Health and Welfare Funds Administration of Human Resource Programs (except Education, Public Health, and Veterans' Affairs Programs) Consumption tax Agricultural subsidies Groceries keyword: food subsidies necessity good optimal tax structure welfarist/non‐welfarist social welfare function food subsidies necessity good optimal tax structure welfarist/non‐welfarist social welfare function ab: In this article, we extend a benchmark model to allow for a non‐welfarist social welfare function (SWF) that treats food as a necessity good rather than a regular good, while preserving the assumption that individuals are rational. We show that the widespread use of food subsidies by governments worldwide for redistributive purposes can be justified by recognizing food as a necessity good in almost all societies. Specifically, (1) If food is treated as a regular good, food consumption should be neither taxed nor subsidized; (2) If food is treated as a necessity good, food consumption should be subsidized; and (3) The higher the "basic need" for food, the more heavily food consumption should be subsidized. We argue that our model provides a general theoretical framework that can also justify subsidies for other necessity goods, including essential utilities such as electricity and gas. Additionally, our model suggests that adopting a non‐welfarist SWF would result in the breakdown of the Atkinson–Stiglitz theorem. pubtype: Academic Journal doctype: Article src: R language: English refInfo: copyright: @attributes: flag: N holdings: @attributes: islocal: N |
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