In her master thesis, Getz Wold seeks to evaluate the social economic wellbeing of single parent households across eleven European countries. Starting with market income, taxes and transfers are incorporated to arrive at a disposable income figure. Effort is further made to include the value of in kind transfers, more specifically education and health care services. This results in an extended income concept, where redistribution both in cash and in kind is accounted for. I further seek to investigate the connection between universal versus targeted welfare benefits, and the economic redistribution directed towards single parent households. In accordance with previous findings my hypothesis is that single parents will benefit more in regimes with universal benefits due to the higher level of welfare state generosity found in such regimes.
Single parents are found to obtain an equalized market income only 60% as high as other parents. This figure increases to 72% once the tax-transfer system is accounted for, implying an increase in relative income of around 20%. Adding education and health care benefits to the analysis further increases relative single parent income by 10%, resulting in a total equalized income 79% as high as other parents. Cash redistribution is thus found to account for two thirds of the redistributive effect, while the remaining impact is caused by in kind income. Including more publicly provided goods in the analysis should increase the relative importance of in kind redistribution further. Total redistribution is found to be high in the Nordic countries, at above 50%. In accordance with the hypothesis, it thus seems as though single parents are important beneficiaries of universal welfare regimes, even though these do not specifically target low income households. The results further suggest that type of welfare regime is an important indicator in assessing the re-distributional gain directed at single parent households.