The American Enterprise Institute hosts a forum today on the new book by Casey B. Mulligan (University of Chicago, Department of Economics), The Redistribution Recession (Oxford University Press, Oct. 2012):

The social safety net became more generous under Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama, and as a result massively altered employment patterns in the labor market.

I have explained in previous posts how public moneys have recently been used to help the unemployed, the poor and the financially distressed endure the recession, but at the same time have dramatically eroded incentives for people to maintain their own living standards by seeking, accepting and retaining jobs, as well as incentives for employers to create jobs that are attractive to workers.

My forthcoming book The Redistribution Recession [Oxford University Press, Oct. 2012] (see the introductory chapter online) quantifies those incentives and their changes over time in terms of marginal tax rates, which refer to the extra taxes paid, and subsidies forgone, as a result of working, expressed as a ratio to the income from working. …

At this AEI event, Mulligan will present the findings of his book, followed by comments from Robert Moffitt of Johns Hopkins University and an audience question-and-answer session. AEI’s Alan Viard will moderate.