Income Distribution Commons^™

Burden Of Disease Associated With Lower Levels Of Income Among Us Adults Aged 65 And Older, Erica I. Lubetkin, Haomia Jia

Publications and Research

Background: Persons aged 65 years and older represent a heterogeneous group whose prevalence in the USA is expected to markedly increase. Few investigations have examined the total burden of disease attributable to lower levels of income in a single number that accounts for morbidity and mortality.

Methods: We ascertained respondents’ health-related quality of life (HRQOL) scores and mortality status from the 2003 to 2004, 2005 to 2006, 2007 to 2008 and 2009 to 2010 cohorts of the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) with mortality follow-up through 31 December 2011. A mapping algorithm based on respondents’ age and answers …

An Empirical Study Of Earnings Of Immigrants And Native-Born Americans In The U.S. Labor Market Given Different Levels Of Educational Attainment, Yuli P. Gomez Bravo

Applied Economics Theses

This paper will compare the Lifetime wage earnings of immigrants and native-born citizens in the U.S. for the years 2000-2010 according to educational attainment using cross-sectional data. The data obtained through IPUMS-CPS Integrated Public Use of Microdata Series, University of Minnesota. The findings of investment in Human Capital of Mincer (1958), the Immigrants earnings distribution of Chiswick and Miller (2006), the Pareto’s law of income distribution, and the immigrants investment in human capital model by Duleep and Regets (1999) are the theoretical basis in which this study will be ruled. The empirical evidence suggests that immigrants who invest in education …

What If Piketty Is Right? Real Economic Costs Of Rising Income Inequality, Thomas Gottschang

Economics Department Working Papers

Thomas Piketty's analysis of income and wealth distribution, Capital in the Twenty-First Century, argues that wealth has become increasingly concentrated in the hands of the most affluent, while lower and middle class real incomes have stagnated; he warns that this trend could have “potentially terrifying” results, possibly even violent revolution. This article presents evidence that growing inequality weakens the entire economy by eroding the purchasing power of the vast majority of the population and the education of the labor force, while increasing its vulnerability to future collapses of the financial markets. It agrees with Piketty's concern that the capitalist market …

Measuring The Financial Shocks Of Natural Disasters: A Panel Study Of U.S. States, Qing Miao, Yilin Hou, Michael Abrigo

Center for Policy Research

This paper employs panel vector autoregression to examine the dynamic fiscal response to disaster shocks. With 50-state, 1970-2013 panel data of state government finance and disaster damage, we estimate disaster impacts on revenue, expenditure, debt issuance, and intergovernmental transfers. We find that following a disaster, states increase program expenditure, but receive more federal transfers. Disasters have limited impact on total tax revenues but amplify fluctuations in sales, income, and property tax revenues. Our findings suggest that disaster-induced additional spending is largely financed through federal transfers, which include not only disaster relief funds but also non-disaster-related public welfare aids.

The Nominalistic Principle: A Legal Approach To Inflation, Deflation, Devaluation And Revaluation, Alain H. Sheer

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

Income Distribution, Export Instability, And Savings Behavior, David Lim

Prof. David Lim

This paper examines the effects of income distribution and export instability on the savings ratios of a group of 12 developed and 52 less developed countries (DCs and LDCs) for 1968-73. The effect of income distribution on savings has been studied before but not on as comprehensive a group of countries as presented here. The effect of export instability on savings has not been examined before in the literature on the determinants of savings behavior. It has, however, been discussed in the literature on the relationship between export instability and economic growth and part of the purpose of this paper …

The Meaning And Measurement Of Income Mobility, Gary S. Fields, Efe A. Ok

Gary S Fields

Income mobility may be seen as arising from two sources: (i) the transfer of income among individuals with total income held constant, and (ii) a change in the total amount of income available. In this paper, we propose several sensible properties defining the concept of income mobility and show that an easily applicable measure of mobility is uniquely implied by these properties. We also show that the resulting measure is additively decomposable into the two sources listed above, namely, mobility due to the transfer of income within a given structure and mobility due to economic growth or contraction. Finally, these …

Income-Generating Functions In A Low Income Country: Colombia, Gary S. Fields, T. Paul Schultz

Gary S Fields

Income generating functions are statistical tools used to explain income inequality and other economic outcomes and behavior. These functions are often associated with a strict human capital framework, but they need not be. Instead, they may be viewed as a reduced form equation summarizing the relationship between income and various personal and locational characteristics. Following this latter interpretation, we develop the regression and analysis of variance approaches to income generating functions and estimate them empirically using micro-economic data from one low income country, Colombia. Proceeding to increasingly parsimonious specifications of income generating functions, insights are gained into the structure of …

Employment, Income Distribution And Economic Growth In Seven Small Open Economies, Gary S. Fields

Gary S Fields

[Excerpt] Resurgent interest has been manifested among development economists in trickle-down, i.e., the view that the more rapid the rate of economic growth, the more rapid the improvement in employment and income distribution. Throughout this paper, the term ‘income distribution’ will refer to the location and dispersion of the pattern of incomes, i.e., to ‘absolute incomes and poverty’ and to ‘relative income inequality’. Empirical evidence supports trickle-down in some cases, but the evidence is contrary to trickle-down in others.

These data indicate:

1. A high rate of economic growth is neither necessary nor sufficient for inequality to decline.
2. A high rate …

Income Distribution And Economic Growth, Gary S. Fields

Gary S Fields

[Excerpt] Who benefits how much from economic growth and why? This question is fundamental to today’s development economics. This chapter reviews some of the major lessons learned and major directions for future research in the study of income distribution and economic development.

Employment And Economic Growth In Costa Rica, Gary S. Fields

Gary S Fields

Costa Rica’s economic growth in the last 25 years has had favorable labor market and income distribution consequences. Overall, employment growth kept pace with labor force growth, the mix of jobs improved, real wages rose, and relative inequality and absolute poverty fell. But during the economic crisis of 1980-82, when real per capita income plummeted, labor market conditions deteriorated markedly: unemployment doubled, employment composition worsened, and real wages fell by 40%. Growth, labor market conditions, and income distribution have moved together.

Three Essays On The Macroeconomic Impacts Of Rent Seeking, Kurt Von Seekamm

Doctoral Dissertations

Chapter 1 of this dissertation focuses on the political economy of rent seeking. Using trading in financial markets, patent litigation and managerial privilege as descriptive examples from the modern economy, it identifies situations where rent seeking opportunities occur. The challenge of correctly distinguishing between productive activities and rent seeking activities demonstrate the empirical challenges of examining rent seeking. This chapter also suggests that in addition to the opportunity cost of physical capital, modern rent seeking has a significant opportunity cost in the form of the misallocation of human capital. Chapter 2 explores the relationship between increased rent seeking, aggregate demand, …

Homogeneity Pursuit In Panel Data Models: Theory And Applications, Wuyi Wang, Peter C. B. Phillips, Liangjun Su

Research Collection School Of Economics

This paper studies estimation of a panel data model with latent structures where individuals can be classified into different groups where slope parameters are homogeneous within the same group but heterogeneous across groups. To identify the unknown group structure of vector parameters, we design an algorithm called Panel-CARDS which is a systematic extension of the CARDS procedure proposed by Ke, Fan, and Wu (2015) in a cross section framework. The extension addresses the problem of comparing vector coefficients in a panel model for homogeneity and introduces a new concept of controlled classification of multidimensional quantities called the segmentation net. We …

Essays On Human Capital And Inequality, Youngmin Park

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This thesis conducts positive and normative analysis of inequality based on human capital theory. In Chapter 2, we document important differences in early child investments by family income and study four leading mechanisms thought to explain these gaps: intergenerational ability correlation, consumption value of investment, information frictions, and credit constraints. We evaluate whether these mechanisms are consistent with other stylized facts related to the marginal returns on investments and the effects of parental income on child investments and skills.

In Chapter 3, I study optimal higher education subsidies when parents’ willingness to pay for their children's education differs due to …

La Influencia Del Mercado En La Crianza De Alpacas En Las Comunidades Alto Andinas De Pucará, Jessica Casale

Student Publications

Using a social-anthropological approach, through first-hand experiences living in the field and speaking with the subjects of this study, this paper investigates how the global economic market of alpaca wool has had effect on the traditional cultural practices of alpaca herders in the high Andean communities of Pucará, Peru. The results reveal a loss of traditional Andean herder’s practices and beliefs in the face of modernization, the inequality and exploitation within the wool market, and the influence of western economic ideologies. To preserve cultural practices and enhance the conditions of an alpaca herder, I suggest educating the communities on more …

Putting Short-Time Compensation To Work: How Employers Can Avert Layoffs And Reduce Training Costs, David E. Balducchi, Stephen A. Wandner

Employment Research Newsletter

No abstract provided.

La Construcción De Una Identidad Propia Por Parte De Las Mujeres Piqueteras De Claypole, Como Protagonistas, Dentro Del Frente De Organizaciones En Lucha (Fol) / Mujeres Piqueteras Of Claypole Constructing Their Own Identity As Protagonists Within The Frente De Organizaciones En Lucha (Fol), Luz Daniela Castro

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

In the late 1990s in Argentina, the model of neoliberalism transformed political and economic policies, aggravated free trade and promoted the privatization of companies and free enterprise. A direct consequence was job instability, with masses amounts of unemployment prevailing, and no action nor response pursued by the state. As a result, the unemployed workers “desocupdos” came together and introduced new repertoires of action: the picketing “piquetes” and the temporary blockage of roads “corte de rutas”. The movement’s first appearance was in the Cutral-Có y Plaza Huincul in the Province of Neuquén (1996-97), extended to Salta and Jujuy (1997) and then …

“Give A Man A Fish: Reflections On The New Politics Of Distribution”, By James Ferguson [Book Review], Daniela Atanasova

Southern African Journal of Policy and Development

Development policy and discourse have long shied away from the idea of giving money directly to the poor. In his latest book, anthropologist James Ferguson argues that this reluctance is slowly giving way. He documents a veritable ‘cash transfer revolution’ taking place in the Global South, with countries such as South Africa, Brazil and Namibia in the vanguard. Drawing on a rich empirical and ethnographic literature on cash transfers and the livelihoods of the poor, with a focus on southern Africa, Ferguson delivers a thought-provoking analysis of the genesis, limitations and radical potential of these programmes. At its most original, …

Is Predicted Data A Viable Alternative To Real Data?, Tomoki Fujii, Roy Van Der Weide

Research Collection School Of Economics

It is costly to collect the household- andindividual-level data that underlies official estimates of poverty and health. Forthis reason, developing countries often do not have the budget to update their estimatesof poverty and health regularly, even though these estimates are most neededthere. One way to reduce the financial burden is to substitute some of the realdata with predicted data. An approach referred to as double sampling collectsthe expensive outcome variable for a sub-sample only while collecting thecovariates used for prediction for the full sample. The objective of this studyis to determine if this would indeed allow for realizing meaningful reductionsin …

Is Predicted Data A Viable Alternative To Real Data?, Tomoki Fujii, Roy Van Der Weide

Research Collection School Of Economics

It is costly to collect the household- and individual-level data that underlies official estimates of poverty and health. For this reason, developing countries often do not have the budget to update their estimates of poverty and health regularly, even though these estimates are most needed there. One way to reduce the financial burden is to substitute some of the real data with predicted data. An approach referred to as double sampling collects the expensive outcome variable for a sub-sample only while collecting the covariates used for prediction for the full sample. The objective of this study is to determine if …

Welfare Reform And The Intergenerational Transmission Of Dependence, Robert Paul Hartley, Carlos Lamarche, James P. Ziliak

University of Kentucky Center for Poverty Research Discussion Paper Series

We estimate the effect of welfare reform on the intergenerational transmission of welfare participation using a long panel of mother-daughter pairs over the survey period 1968-2013 in the Panel Study of Income Dynamics. Because states implemented welfare reform at different times starting in 1992, the cross-state variation over time permits us to quasi-experimentally separate out the effect of mothers’ participation on daughters’ welfare choice in the pre- and post-welfare reform periods. Our empirical framework also addresses potential issues in identifying a causal pathway from parent to child that arise from correlated unobservables in welfare decisions, misclassification error in survey reports, …

Democratization, Political Performance, And Income Distribution In Argentina And Brazil, Nicholas Paul Stowell

Dissertations and Theses

This research examines the effects of democratization and political performance on the functional distribution of income in Argentina and Brazil from the end of their authoritarian periods to the present. The existing literature tends to focus on the impacts of democratization and political performance on the economic growth of the country as a whole or on changes to per capita income. This analysis focuses on the equality of economic development in less developed countries because growth is not necessarily distributed equally and poverty and inequality are both endemic to many less developed countries and also negatively impact development as a …

Natural Disasters In Latin America: The Role Of Disaster Type And Productive Sector On The Urban-Rural Income Gap And Rural To Urban Migration, Madeline Alice Messick

Dissertations

This research provides insight into the impact of natural disasters as drivers of rural to urban migration in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC). Disasters of varying types are predicted to have differing impacts on the productive sectors of agriculture, industry, and services; which due to the concentration of the various productive sectors in either urban or rural areas, subsequently changes the urban-rural wage differential. Changes to the wage differential (as measured by the urban-rural income gap) are predicted to lead to movement between urban and rural areas until a new equilibrium wage is reached.

This dissertation first identifies a …

Earnings Mobility In Times Of Growth And Decline: Argentina From 1996 To 2003, Gary S. Fields, María Laura Sánchez Puerta

Gary S Fields

In recent years, the economy of Argentina has experienced both rapid economic growth and severe economic decline. In this paper, we use a series of one-year long panels to study who gained the most in pesos when the economy grew and who lost the most in pesos when the economy contracted. Various considerations led us to expect that mobility would be divergent—that is, that the individuals who started with the highest initial earnings would enjoy the largest earnings gains in pesos. Contrary to expectations and for a wide range of specifications, mobility is found to be mostly convergent, sometimes neutral, …

Self-Employment And Poverty In Developing Countries, Gary S. Fields

Gary S Fields

A key way for the world’s poor—nearly half of humanity—to escape poverty is to earn more for their labor. Most of the world’s poor people are self-employed, but because there are few opportunities in most developing countries for them to earn enough to escape poverty, they are working hard but working poor. Two key policy planks in the fight against poverty should be: raising the returns to self-employment and creating more opportunities to move from self-employment into higher paying wage employment.

Income Mobility: Concepts And Measures, Gary S. Fields

Gary S Fields

People’s economic positions may change for a variety of reasons. The economy in which they participate may improve or deteriorate because of macroeconomic growth or contraction, employer-specific events and circumstances, business expansions and contractions, and ups and downs in local communities. Individuals may experience major life events with important economic consequences, among them completion of schooling, promotions and other movements up the career ladder, marriage and divorce, poor health, and retirement. Economic mobility studies are concerned with quantifying the movement of given recipient units through the distribution of economic well-being over time, establishing how dependent ones current economic position is …

Challenges And Policy Lessons For The Growth-Employment-Poverty Nexus In Developing Countries, Gary S. Fields

Gary S Fields

Productivity growth and structural change are generally considered to be important determinants of economic growth. However recent research revealed that they do not necessarily lead to higher growth and employment rates. Recent studies, drawing on data from developing countries, showed that only the “right” kind of productivity growth resulted in higher employment rates. Enterprises in Africa and Latin America caught up in matters of technology; however, this process resulted in a substitution of employment by technology. The same is true for structural change; only the “right” kind of structural change caused more growth and employment. Whereas in Asia, labour shifted …

Are African Workers Getting Ahead In The New South Africa? Evidence From Kwazulu-Natal, 1993-1998, Paul L. Cichello, Gary S. Fields, Murray Leibbrandt

Gary S Fields

[Excerpt] In this paper, we use the KIDS panel data to answer three questions about the ‘progress’ of African workers in this one province in post-apartheid South Africa. First, how have African workers progressed as a group? Secondly, which African workers have progressed the most, and by how much have they progressed? Thirdly, to what extent is the progress made by workers driven by transitions between employment and unemployment, or between informal and formal sector employment? We reach the following major findings. First, African workers in KwaZulu-Natal had quite diverse experiences, but experienced positive progress on average. Second, those who …

Earnings Mobility, Inequality, And Economic Growth In Argentina, Mexico, And Venezuela, Gary S. Fields, Robert Duval-Hernandez, Samuel Freije, Maria Laura Sanchez Puerta

Gary S Fields

This paper examines changes in individual earnings during positive and negative growth periods in three Latin American economies: Argentina, Mexico, and Venezuela. We ask two major questions. First, do panel income changes favor the income recipients who started at the top of the income distribution (“divergent mobility”) or those who started at the bottom (“convergent mobility”)? And second, are the groups that are found to gain the most when the economy is growing those that are found to lose the most when the economy is contracting (“symmetry of mobility”) or is the pattern asymmetric in the sense that the same …

Falling Labor Income Inequality In Korea’S Economic Growth: Patterns And Underlying Causes, Gyeongjoon Yoo, Gary S. Fields

Gary S Fields

Over the last twenty-five years, the economy of the Republic of Korea achieved a remarkable growth rate of 7 percent per year in real per capita income, causing it to be labeled, justifiably, as a “miracle economy.” This exceptional economic growth has been accompanied by an even more exceptional fall in labor income inequality. Using a newly-developed methodology, we use data from Korea’s Occupational Wage Surveys to quantify the importance of various factors that have contributed to the fall in labor income inequality in Korea. We find the most important factors explaining the level of income inequality are job tenure, …