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Description
Educating students about the redistributive role of fiscal systems is increasingly important. Active engagement in civil society requires knowledge about governments'' revenues and expenditures and an in-depth understanding of how different fiscal policy components affect various socio-economic groups. While students in all social sciences, particularly in economics, are offered solid background knowledge in microeconomics and public finance, courses related to microeconomic analyses of household data to assess fiscal systems redistributive effects are often lacking.
We aim to broaden the knowledge of academic staff (both those directly participating in the project and others) on methods and tools that enable analyses of fiscal systems’ redistributive effects, their effectiveness and cost-efficiency in inequality and poverty reduction, and contribution of specific fiscal systems’ components in reaching those effects.
Partners in the project would cooperate to exchange knowledge on redistributive effects of taxes and transfers in Poland and Norway, tools and methods used in each country to analyse them, as well as the extent to which students have the opportunity to study these topics.
Summary of project results
As part of the Study Visit, two online preparatory meetings were held and a visit of a delegation from the Faculty of Economic Sciences of the University of Warsaw to the University of South-Eastern Norway, School of Business. The delegation of three people reported in the application (Karolina Goraus-Tańska, Zofia Barbara Liberda, Katarzyna Sałach) flew to Norway on 04/03/2022 and returned to Warsaw on 04/09/2022. During the study visit, the participants co-conducted the open workshop "Workshop: Inequality, redistribution, and social spending - Poland and Norway" (on April 5), conducted a lunch seminar (on April 6), co-conducted a lecture (on April 4), and held numerous meetings at smaller groups with scientific and administrative staff (e.g. with USN Advisor Line Whittall, on the history and functioning of USN, or Siri Bjørnstad, Senior advisor international relations, on USN''s international cooperation.
During the workshops on April 5, the following presentations were presented: (i) Karolina Goraus-Tańska and Jon Reiersen: Information about the EEA Grant system - possibilities for future cooperation, (ii) Karolina Goraus-Tańska and Katarzyna Sałach: The fiscal system in Poland and its redistributive effects, (iii) Barbara Liberda: Intergenerational solidarity - generational accounts, (iv) Jon Reiersen: Perceptions of inequality and preferences for redistribution. On the remaining days, numerous team discussions and subsequent presentations took place: (i) Danuta Tomczak: Institutional conditions for social equality in Poland and Norway, (ii) Jon Reiersen: The Trust-Equality Multiplier: The political economy of redistribution in Norway, (iii) Karolina Goraus-Tańska and Katarzyna Sałach: More on the fiscal system in Poland and its redistributive effects, (iv) Jon Reiersen: Social trust and the COVID-19 pandemic. During numerous team discussions, we also discussed plans for further cooperation.
Summary of bilateral results
Cooperation with the Host Institution went very well. We were in contact even before the trip with Professor Jon Reiersen, who devoted a great deal of time to us every day during our stay and provided great opportunities for us to develop and collaborate with USN academics (co-teaching classes, jointly organizing workshops, leading a lunch seminar, numerous discussions, presentations, etc.). We also received support from the administrative staff, who organized meetings to discuss the functioning of the Host Institution, or opportunities for cooperation, e.g. on 04.04 we attended a meeting with USN advisor Line Whittall regarding the history and functioning of USN as a whole, and the role of the USN School of Business; there was also a tour of the campus. On 08.04, a meeting was held with Camilla Nereid (Head of department) and Siri Bjørnstad (Senior advisor international relations) regarding USN''s cooperation with international partners.