This paper offers a new way of assessing government transfer programs using a social welfare function framework. It demonstrates how one can use social welfare functions to measure such programs' efficiency without requiring the specification of a poverty line or particular poverty measures. The paper introduces three alternative principles of targeting, which provide a basis for measuring program efficiency. By applying the methodology developed in this paper, we compare the targeting efficiencies of 44 countries, which include both middle and high-income countries.

中文翻译：

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评估政府转移计划的社会福利效应：一些国际比较

本文提供了一种使用社会福利函数框架评估政府转移计划的新方法。它展示了如何使用社会福利函数来衡量此类计划的效率，而无需指定贫困线或特定的贫困衡量标准。本文介绍了三种可供选择的目标原则，它们为衡量项目效率提供了基础。通过应用本文开发的方法，我们比较了 44 个国家的目标效率，其中包括中等收入和高收入国家。