{"title":"Immigration and public attitudes towards social assistance: evidence from Hong Kong","authors":"Shen Yang, B. Miao, Alfred M. Wu","doi":"10.1080/17487870.2020.1760102","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT The paper investigates the puzzling phenomenon of why Hong Kong citizens have much lower support for increasing spending on social assistance when all other welfare programs have been favored by local residents. With a random sampling survey, we find that citizens’ support towards raising the requirement of immigration is negatively correlated with their support for social assistance (the CSSA scheme). This study highlights that the perception of “who benefits” will influence citizens’ support for welfare spending. The Hong Kong story enriches the debate about the impact of citizens’ attitudes towards immigration on welfare spending against a backdrop of deglobalization and anti-immigration.","PeriodicalId":51737,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Economic Policy Reform","volume":"25 1","pages":"28 - 44"},"PeriodicalIF":3.3000,"publicationDate":"2020-07-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/17487870.2020.1760102","citationCount":"9","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Journal of Economic Policy Reform","FirstCategoryId":"96","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17487870.2020.1760102","RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"DEVELOPMENT STUDIES","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 9
Abstract
ABSTRACT The paper investigates the puzzling phenomenon of why Hong Kong citizens have much lower support for increasing spending on social assistance when all other welfare programs have been favored by local residents. With a random sampling survey, we find that citizens’ support towards raising the requirement of immigration is negatively correlated with their support for social assistance (the CSSA scheme). This study highlights that the perception of “who benefits” will influence citizens’ support for welfare spending. The Hong Kong story enriches the debate about the impact of citizens’ attitudes towards immigration on welfare spending against a backdrop of deglobalization and anti-immigration.
期刊介绍:
The Journal of Economic Policy Reform focuses on the analysis of economic policy reform. The journal draws upon what lessons can be learned from the successes and failures of countries undertaking reforms and how existing theories can be developed to shed light on positive as well as normative aspects of the reform process. The Journal of Economic Policy Reform encourages work from economists and political economy analysts on policies to promote growth and reduce poverty, intellectual property rights, aid versus trade, debt and debt relief, taxation and social security systems, surveys of key reform issues, as well as on corruption, democracy, emerging markets and the role of multilateral institutions.