Equity and efficiency effects of redistributive policies$

How do various forms of redistribution affect the distributions of earnings and consumption and their intergenerational mobility? Do redistributive policies enhance efficiency by mitigating market imperfections? Or do they create a trade-off between equity and efficiency? To address these issues, a dynamic general equilibrium model is constructed and solved numerically. The effects of the degrees of targeting of money transfers and educational transfers and the relative performance of the two types of transfers are examined. r 2004 Published by Elsevier B.V.