TEMPORARY AND PERSISTENT POVERTY AMONG ETHNIC MINORITIES AND THE MAJORITY IN RURAL CHINA

Poverty among ethnic minorities and the majority in rural China for the years 2000, 2001 and 2002 is investigated, taking a dynamic view and using a large sample covering 22 provinces. Based on the National Bureau of Statistics' low income line, almost one-third of the ethnic minorities experienced poverty during the three years studied while the corresponding proportion among the ethnic majority was only about half as high. Still, by far most of the poor in rural China belong to the ethnic majority. The relatively high poverty rates for ethnic minorities in rural China are found to be due to higher rates of entry than for the majority, while differences in exit rates across ethnicities are few. To a large extent, ethnic poverty differences can be attributed to differences in location, together with temporary and persistent poverty in rural China having a very clear spatial character. Poverty is concentrated in the western region and villages with low average income. Determinants of persistent and temporary poverty in rural China differ due to location as well as household characteristics.     

Romanians,Hungarians and their wages,in transition,in Romania

Legally binding treaties or memorandums have been used over time to regulate the issue of national borders of many European countries. As a result, relatively large groups of people have become ethnic minorities in other countries. They may conserve their ethnic identities, and therefore their children may accumulate ethnic human capital (e.g., language, culture, and religion) in addition to the general human capital of the country. Therefore, they can get access to an appropriate occupation linked by tradition or other factors to their ethnic group. This paper uses estimates from a selection model with an endogenous switch among three broad types of occupational groups to analyze the composition of the wage gap between Romanians and ethnic Hungarians in Romania before and during the transition from a planned to a market economy. The results suggest that the institutional settings of the controlled economy allowed Romanians to work in occupations that gave them the best returns, while the changes during the transition years allowed ethnic Hungarians to work in occupations that gave them the best returns.     

Inequality in Vietnamese Urban–Rural Living Standards, 1993–2006

We investigate urban–rural inequality in Vietnam using data from the Vietnam Living Standard Surveys between 1993 and 2006. We find that mean per capita expenditure of urban households is consistently twice as much as that of rural households and that the urban–rural gap monotonically increases from the poorer to the richer groups of the expenditure distribution. To isolate factors contributing to the urban–rural gap, we apply the Oaxaca–Blinder type decomposition to a newly developed unconditional quantile regression method. Factors contributing significantly to the high urban–rural gap include inter‐group differences in education, household age structure, labor market activity, geographic location and their related returns, with education playing the most important role. Over the period, consistent with the country's massive rural–urban migration, we find that domestic remittance plays a significant role in shortening the urban–rural expenditure gap in the later years, 2002 and 2006.     

Poverty among ethnic minorities: the transition process,inequality and economic growth

This article investigates the process of reducing poverty in ethnic minority households. Using two recent Vietnam household surveys, we find that ethnic minority households are more likely to be persistently poor and less likely to be persistently non-poor than ethnic majority households. The within-group component generated by the variation in income within each ethnicity group explains more than 90% of the change in total inequality. Income redistribution plays an important role in decreasing the poverty gap and decreasing poverty severity. Different ethnic groups have different poverty patterns, which should be noted when designing policies to alleviate poverty and inequality.     

Are Returns to Investment Lower for the Poor? Human and Physical Capital Interactions in Rural Vietnam

If the gains from investment depend on knowledge, but households cannot hire skills, then poorly educated households will achieve lower returns than educated ones. If the income‐poor are less well educated, then they will also have lower returns to investment. The paper tests this argument for the case of irrigation in Vietnam, a setting where existing irrigation can be treated as exogenous at the household level with appropriate controls for the determinants of facility placement. Strong complementarities between household education and irrigation expansion suggest that, unless disparities in education are redressed, reforms will generate an inequitable growth process in Vietnam.     

The economic importance of non-timber forest products (NTFPs) for livelihood maintenance of rural west African communities: A case study from northern Benin

Non-timber forest products (NTFPs) contribute significantly to a rural household's livelihood in the African semi-arid tropics. This study examines the income from NTFPs and the dependency on these of different socio-economic groups in Northern Benin. Using survey data from 230 households of two villages, we firstly compared incomes of five different ethnic groups being differentiated by their traditional source of livelihood and regional provenance. Secondly, we investigated disparities between three income groups. On average, income from NTFPs accounted for 39% of total household income and had a strong equalizing effect on it. However, the economic relevance of NTFPs differs between households: Poorer households are relatively more dependent on NTFPs in order to fulfill basic needs than wealthier households. However, the latter extract more NTFPs in quantitative terms and have significantly higher cash returns than poorer ones. This is mainly due to a significant greater land holding. Moreover, our study revealed that net income from NTFPs reflects traditional sources of livelihoods of different ethnic groups. In conclusion, both conservation and development strategies should take into consideration the socio-economic context of different beneficiaries of savanna woodland resources in order to apply appropriate measures to poverty reduction.     

Numerical Information Format and Investment Decisions: Implications for the Disposition Effect and the Status Quo Bias

Investment decisions are very difficult because they involve money and can impact our quality of life. According to the axioms of rationality, different but equivalent information formats should not affect investment strategies. The authors perform two experiments here, and find evidence of a strong absolute magnitude effect on investment decisions. In Experiment 1, participants (students) chose to sell a losing fund more often when returns were expressed as a percentage of variation between the buying value and the actual value (e.g., 24%) than when they were expressed as a monetary difference between the buying price and the actual price (e.g., $0.24). In the context of the experiment, the percentage format decreased the disposition effect significantly. Furthermore, describing the stock returns as ratios (e.g., ¼) increased the tendency toward the status quo bias. In Experiment 2, the authors showed that the absolute magnitude of the numbers shaped participants' satisfaction with fund returns, and was responsible for the different choices of investment strategies.     

Have the returns to education really increased in Vietnam? Wage versus employment effect

Many studies have analyzed changes in the returns to education in globalizing economies using the Mincerian framework. These studies have typically estimated the returns to education in terms of changes in wages rather than employment, effectively ignoring the fact that during globalization not only wages but also employment patterns are affected. In this paper we use four large-scale representative household surveys from the transition economy Vietnam for the period 1998–2006 to estimate the returns to education taking into account both changes in wages and employment. The results show that the estimated increases in returns to education are lower once changes in employment patterns are taken into account.     

Voting with abstention

Most voting models in the literature neglect abstention, but is such a simplification justified? I investigate this question in a model with outside pressure on voters. For sequential voting (e.g., roll call votes), with and without an abstention option, there is a unique subgame perfect equilibrium, which implies that true majorities always succeed. Abstention can be an equilibrium strategy for some voters, in particular under complex decision rules (e.g., weighted voting, double majorities). Simultaneous voting often has a unique pure strategy equilibrium but also a plethora of mixed and pure/mixed strategy equilibria. Therefore, only with equilibrium selection, can we evaluate the consequences of neglecting abstention. For equal weight voting, equilibria selected by the procedure of Harsanyi and Selten change completely with an abstention option, even if abstention itself is not or rarely used. With small enough outside pressure, however, the selected equilibrium honors true majorities in both cases.     

Lending policies of informal, formal and semiformal lenders

This paper compares lending policies of formal, informal and semiformal lenders with respect to household lending in Vietnam. The analysis suggests that the probability of using formal or semiformal credit increases if borrowers provide collateral, a guarantor and/or borrow for business‐related activities. The probability of using informal credit increases for female borrowers. It also appears that the probability of using formal credit increases in household welfare up to a certain threshold, but at a decreasing rate. In addition, the paper discerns the determinants of probability of default across lender types. Default risk of formal credit appears to be strongly affected by formal loan contract terms, e.g., loan interest rate and form of loan repayment, whereas default risk on informal loans is significantly related to the presence of propinquity and other internal characteristics of the borrowing household. Overall, the study raises several important implications for the screening, monitoring and enforcement instruments that may be employed by different types of lenders.     

西部少数民族地区教育收益率的分析——以云南少数民族地区为例

文章运用“中国综合社会调查(CGSS)”中关于云南少数民族地区的抽样调查数据,研究了云南少数民族地区的教育收益率及其影响因素.文章发现,云南少数民族地区的教育收益率明显低于全国其它地区,少数民族地区的教育投资仍然严重不足.在云南的少数民族地区,汉族与少数民族的差异,并没有对教育的收益率带来明显的影响;城乡差距对教育收益率存在明显影响;落后地区的青少年接受专业教育与职业教育的教育收益率明显低于基础教育的教育收益率;性别差异的存在依旧显著的影响了民族地区的教育收益率.     

Does ethnic diversity decrease economic interactions? Evidence from exchange networks in rural Gambia

Using a unique dataset collected in 59 rural Gambian villages, we study how ethnic heterogeneity is related to the structure of four economic exchange networks: land, labour, inputs and credit. We find that different measures of village‐level ethnic fragmentation are mostly uncorrelated with network structure. At a more disaggregated level, household heads belonging to ethnic minorities are not less central than those from the predominant ethnicity in any of the networks and, at the dyadic level, the fact that two households share ethnicity is not an economically significant predictor of link formation. Our results indicate that, in the particular setting of our study, the structure of the exchange networks is better defined by other variables than ethnicity and that ethnic heterogeneity is unlikely to be a driver for sub‐optimal economic exchanges.     

Economic growth and the demand for education: is there a wealth effect?

Human capital investment in developing countries is thought to be significantly constrained by household resources. This paper studies the relationship between household resources and the demand for education using recent household survey data from Vietnam. The data cover a period, 1993–1998, of exceptional income growth in Vietnam, during which secondary school enrollment rose substantially. Using consumption expenditures to measure household wealth, we find a positive and significant relationship between changes in wealth and changes in the demand for education. This wealth effect persists even after controlling for locality-specific factors such as changes in education returns and the supply and quality of schools, and for the opportunity costs of schooling.     

Continued decline for ethnic minorities in the transition?

Using three Bulgarian cross‐sectional household surveys from 1986, 1993 and 1997, this essay shows that the mean log wage differential between ethnic Bulgarians and Turks increased from 0.1615 in 1986 to 0.2874 in 1993 and again to 0.4075 by 1997. Bulgarian gains over ethnic Turks in the early transition are related to both changes in the relative returns to skill and changes in the composition of demand for goods and services as the country moved toward a market economy. The Turks began the transition with fewer years of education than the Bulgarians, and began to close the education gap over this time. The Bulgarians, however, were more likely to have obtained more general secondary and university degrees than the ethnic Turks – degrees that, in contrast to technical or vocational degrees, are experiencing increased remuneration in the transition. With more of an asset that has become more valuable, the ethnic Bulgarians improved their relative position.     

基于语言分区的海南岛民族民系传统聚落景观特征分析

由汉、黎、苗等民族民系聚落构成的多元化地域景观是海南岛乡土景观的有机组成方式。语言是民族民系文化区划的重要标识，基于海南岛的语言分区，采用跨学科研究方法，分别从宏观、中观、微观层面选取各语言分区传统聚落景观特质的关键指征，结合GIS技术对其进行信息叠加和比较分析，归纳总结出海南岛民族民系传统聚落景观3个显著的分异特征。1)在选址偏好上具有汉族聚落海拔低、黎苗聚落海拔高的特点；在聚居地规模上具有汉族聚居地规模大、黎苗聚居地规模小的特点。2)在用地布局上汉族多采用集约式布局，黎苗则为分散式布局；在街巷肌理上汉族聚落较为规整，黎苗趋向自由。3)在民居组织方式上汉族为围合式，黎苗为开放式；在建筑平面形制上汉族为合院式，黎苗为独栋式。海南岛的聚落景观多元化是建构在岛屿本身生态多样性和文化多样性的基础上的，可成为海南岛保护与开发的出发点和依据。     

Is the emerging non‐farm market economy the route out of poverty in Vietnam?

Are the household characteristics that are good for the transition to a more diversified market‐oriented economy in Vietnam also important for reducing poverty? Or are there trade‐offs? The determinants of both poverty incidence and participation in rural off‐farm activities are modeled as functions of household and community characteristics using comprehensive national household surveys for 1993 and 1998. While there are some common causative factors, such as education and region of residence, the processes determining poverty and inhibiting diversification are clearly not the same. Participation in the emerging rural non‐farm market economy will be the route out of poverty for some, but certainly not all, of Vietnam's poor.     

Internet use and agricultural productivity in rural Vietnam

The use of the internet is growing rapidly and has become an engine for economic development. However, few studies have examined the impact of internet use on agricultural production, and the results are not yet conclusive. Employing a dataset of more than 2000 observations in rural Vietnam, our study analyses the impact of internet use on agricultural productivity using the heteroscedasticity-based instrument approach suggested by Lewbel, Journal of Business and Economic Statistics, 2012, 30, 67–80 and examines the heterogeneity and distribution of the impact using quantile regressions. Our results show that internet use has significant and positive effects on agricultural productivity. However, these effects are heterogeneous across population groups. The positive effects of internet use are stronger for households with a lower level of education, with a young and female head, and from ethnic minorities. The benefits are also found to be skewed towards the group of farmers at the bottom of the productivity distribution. Therefore, we propose facilitating the diffusion of the internet, since it not only boosts agricultural productivity, but also reduces productivity inequality. In addition, we recommend promoting rural education, supporting local markets, investing more in irrigation systems, and facilitating farm mechanisation as these factors are found to contribute to increasing agricultural productivity.     

Sometimes,winners lose: Economic disparity and indigenization in Kazakhstan

Several post-Soviet states have introduced indigenization policies to improve the relative economic, political or social position of formerly disadvantaged populations. Using one example of such policies – “Kazakhization” in Kazakhstan – we investigate their impact on the comparative earnings of two directly affected groups, ethnic Kazakhs and ethnic Russians. Oaxaca decompositions show that Kazakhs are better endowed with income generating characteristics but receive lower returns to these characteristics than Russians. The second effect dominates and Kazakhs have comparatively lower average living standards. While “Kazakhization” may have been successful in some sense it appears to also have induced ethnic Russians to move into jobs that (at least in monetary terms) are superior now to those held by Kazakhs.     

Are stocks desirable in tax-deferred accounts?

Existing literature suggests that, in order to maximize the tax benefit of retirement accounts, investors should follow a “pecking order” location rule of placing highly taxed assets (e.g., bonds) in a tax-deferred account and lightly taxed assets (e.g., stocks) in a taxable account. Empirical evidence, however, documents that a large number of investors violate this rule. In this paper, we show that such violations can be optimal for risk-averse investors who face portfolio constraints. In particular, while the strategy of placing bonds in the tax-deferred account maximizes the expected level of tax benefit, it may lead to volatile benefits under different realizations of stock returns. By holding a similar portfolio in both accounts, investors can achieve a more balanced growth in the two accounts, minimize the likelihood of violating the constraints in the future and hence “smooth” the volatility of the tax benefit. For some risk-averse investors, this smoothing motive can lead to the observed violation of the pecking order location rule. Our model predicts that such violations are more likely when future tax benefits are more volatile, which can occur, for example, when: (i) the tax rate differential across assets increases over time due either to tax law changes or to tax bracket changes for investors; (ii) asset returns are more volatile; and (iii) investors anticipate large future liquidity needs.     

Attitudes to Ethnic Minorities, Ethnic Context and Location Decisions

Attitudes of ethnic majority populations towards other communities is a potentially important determinant of social exclusion and welfare of ethnic minorities. The suggestion that negative attitudes towards minorities may be affected by the ethnic composition of the locality in which individuals live has often been made and empirically investigated. We point to a potential for bias in simple estimates of ethnic context effects if individual location decisions are driven partly by attitudinal factors. We also suggest an instrumental variables procedure for overcoming such bias in data with appropriate spatial information. Our results suggest that such a correction may be important.