The principal driver of this “regressive” effect was a lack of regular GMI adjustments. The same is true in the United States: the beneficial effect of some of the “Bush-era” tax cuts on higher-income earners was mainly felt at incomes above the range shown in the graph. The main message from the graph is one of highly progressive redistribution changes in the United States, and flat or regressive changes in most European countries. The only exception is France, where low-earning families with children (but, unlike in the United States, not those with zero earnings) benefited substantially from an “employment-friendly” reform of the GMI benefit, which, among other things, incentivised low-income families to combine work with benefit receipt by reducing benefit withdrawal rates.