This course discusses the Theory of Market Failure from a public finance perspective and provides advanced methods for analyzing public expenditure. Students shall learn to analyze fundamental problems of a welfare state in an independent manner and to assess the economic importance of central welfare institutions within a market economy.

Topics:

• Role of the welfare state

• Market failure and insurance

• Ensuring labor income through the State

• Redistribution by means of income taxation

• Public supply of private goods

• Poverty alleviation