数字普惠金融的创业效应与收入不平等:数字鸿沟还是数字红利？

数字普惠金融与实体经济之间的关系受到学界广泛关注,但其究竟是普惠的数字红利还是金融领域的数字鸿沟,这是数字普惠金融快速发展中亟需回答的重要理论与现实问题。文章通过匹配宏观统计数据和微观调查数据,实证研究了数字普惠金融的发展对收入不平等的影响,并从创业效应这一渠道进行了机制分析。研究发现：数字普惠金融的发展总体上改善了收入不平等状况,而数字普惠金融的创业效应是影响收入不平等的重要渠道之一。进一步的中介效应分析表明,数字普惠金融的创业效应对收入不平等的影响存在异质性：数字普惠金融通过促进生存型创业从而改善了收入不平等,而数字普惠金融对机会型创业的促进却在一定程度上扩大了收入不平等。文章的研究结论对于理解数字普惠金融发展的正外部性以及如何缓解收入不平等提供了新的视角。     

Role of income diversification in reducing forest reliance: Evidence from 1838 rural households in China

Among a number of households worldwide, forest use and income diversification have been seen as substitute livelihood strategies: farmers with more diverse income sources face a higher opportunity cost in harvesting forests and so tend to rely less on forestry resources. The current study uses rural household survey data captured in the Chinese provinces of Fujian, Shaanxi, Hunan, and Jiangxi. It applies a Heckman regression model and a quantile regression model to determine the effect of income diversification on forest dependence. The three main findings of this study are as follows. (1) The mean income diversification index values in Fujian, Shaanxi, Hunan, and Jiangxi are 1.81, 1.46, 1.63, and 2.00, respectively; this indicates that livelihood activities within the study areas are limited. (2) When the income diversification index increases by 10%, the proportion of forest income to total income within the study areas decreases by 4–8%; this indicates that income diversification can significantly reduce a household's dependence on forest resources, especially among the poorest households. (3) For the top 20% of high-income households, the effect of income diversification on forest dependence is insignificant, but for the bottom 20% of low-income households, income diversification has a major impact in terms of reducing their forest reliance (6–10%). The findings of this study will help inform the design of alternative policies that could alleviate pressure relating to forest-resource protection.     

Does the labor-income process contain a unit root? Evidence from individual-specific time series

Calibrations of models related to life-cycle behavior of consumption and saving often invoke the important assumption of a unit root in individuals׳ labor-income process. We for the first time test this assumption using methods for univariate time series. Based on longitudinal register data from 1968 to 2005, we first estimate an autoregressive model for each individual using a method for approximately median-unbiased estimation. We then exploit the resulting distribution of the individual-specific estimates to draw inference about the presence of a unit root. Results indicate that earnings for the representative worker are governed by a process where shocks to earnings have moderate persistence and are both economically and statistically significantly different from having permanent effects. These results question the heavy use of unit-root processes for earnings.     

Does a lower (higher) labour force participation rate imply greater (lower) income tax evasion? An exploratory empirical inquiry for the U.S.

This exploratory study seeks to add to the income tax evasion literature by investigating a heretofore ignored potential determinant of aggregate federal personal income tax evasion in the U.S., namely, the labour force participation rate. It is hypothesized that the higher (lower) the labour force participation rate, the lower (greater) the degree of tax evasion. The empirical estimation supports this hypothesis, finding that a one unit (one percentage point) increase (decrease) in the labour force participation rate leads to a 9.1% decrease (increase) in income tax evasion. Thus, the declining labour force participation in recent years implies increased tax evasion problems for the U.S.     

FINANCE,DISTRIBUTION AND THE ECONOMIC OBJECTIVE OF FINANCIAL COOPERATIVE INSTITUTIONS

This paper proposes a model where the structure rather than the size of the financial sector explains its influence on income distribution. Because of information asymmetries, a financial sector dominated solely by profit‐maximizing financial intermediaries will increase income and wealth inequality as it gives preferential access to credit for high‐income agents, whereas a diversified inclusive financial sector with alternative models of finance, like cooperatives, will reduce the inequality gap. No full convergence in income distribution can be realized through finance only and there is still a need for redistribution policies. Accordingly, an objective function for cooperative financial institutions should define a desired pricing behaviour that can increase the income of members at a rate higher than the average growth rate of the economy.     

The effects of economic growth on income inequality in the US

The paper analyzes the relation between growth and income inequality in the US during the post-war years (1953–2008). We show that the income of the top income groups is more sensitive to growth, defined broadly as current growth and changes in expectations of future growth, compared to the income of the lower income groups. We provide evidence that this increased sensitivity arises for two reasons: (a) the top income groups receive a large portion of their income from wealth, which is more sensitive to growth than labor income and (b) the top income groups receive a large portion of their labor income in the form of pay-for-performance (equity compensation), which is also sensitive to growth. Consequently, we conclude that growth and income inequality are positively associated.     

Economic growth and income inequality in the Asia-Pacific region: A comparative study of China,Japan, South Korea,and the United States

This paper builds an inequality-growth-redistribution nexus, and applies the Engle–Granger two-step ECM approach to estimate the long-run and short-run relationships between inequality and growth for four economies: China, Japan, South Korea, and the United States. Our estimation results support the S-shaped curve hypothesis relating GDP per capita to inequality with different starting points for the four economies. For the reverse relationship, we find a positive causal relationship for China, Japan, and the United States, indicating that increased income inequality spurred economic growth. In addition, we find mixed results on the effect of trade openness on inequality and growth. Trade openness reduced inequality in the United States and Japan, worsened it in China and had no significant effect in South Korea. In the inequality-GDP per capita relationship, exports provided an impetus to economic growth for Japan. As for redistribution, although fiscal redistributive measures reduced inequality in Japan, they played no major role in the other three countries. With regard to the inequality-GDP per capita relationship, all countries except for China show a negative effect of fiscal redistribution on GDP per capita.     

Country Differences in Material Deprivation in Europe

This paper assesses to what extent differences in the characteristics of individuals (micro‐level perspective) and country‐specific factors (macro‐level perspective) can explain country differences with respect to material deprivation levels. Thus, our work aims to simultaneously consider the macro dimension and the predominantly individually‐oriented study field of material deprivation using multilevel techniques. We make use of the European Union Statistics on Income and Living Conditions. Our results show that country‐specific factors seem to be much more relevant than individual effects in explaining country differences in material deprivation. We estimate that the introduction of country‐specific factors reduces the proportion of total variance due to between‐country differences in deprivation by 72.7 percent, while individual‐level variables reduce this proportion by only 9.4 percent. We also show, through interaction variables, that the effect of sociodemographic characteristics can be shaped by institutional and structural factors, especially by the level of GDP.     

Positive and normative judgments implicit in U.S. tax policy,and the costs of unequal growth and recessions

Calculating the welfare implications of changes to economic policy or shocks requires economists to decide on a normative criterion. One approach is to elicit the relevant moral criteria from real-world policy choices, converting a normative decision into a positive inference, as in the recent surge of “inverse-optimum” research. We find that capitalizing on the potential of this approach is not as straightforward as we might hope. We perform the inverse-optimum inference on U.S. tax policy from 1979 through 2010 and argue that the results either undermine the normative relevance of the approach or challenge conventional assumptions upon which economists routinely rely when performing welfare evaluations.     

Income and Price Elasticities of Demand in South Africa: An Application of the Linear Expenditure System

This paper investigates the expenditure patterns of South African households using detailed cross‐sectional expenditure and price data that varies across region and time. Linear expenditure system parameter estimates are used to calculate income and price elasticities for a number of product categories at different points of the income distribution. We find substantial variation in the price and income elasticities of demand for items across the income distribution, with the bottom quartile being extremely sensitive to increases in the price of food and clothing items, and the top quartile being as sensitive as households in developed countries.