The effects of location and sectoral components of economic growth on poverty: Evidence from Indonesia

In this paper, we investigate the relationship between economic growth and poverty reduction by differentiating growth and poverty into their sectoral composition and urban–rural location using data from Indonesia. We find that rural services growth reduces poverty in all sectors and locations. However, urban services growth has the largest effect on poverty in most sectors. Finally, we also find that rural agriculture growth strongly reduces poverty in rural areas, the largest contributor to poverty in Indonesia. This implies that while agriculture growth in rural areas still plays a major role in reducing poverty, policies that enable strong growth in the services sector in both urban and rural areas would expedite poverty reduction.     

Microdeterminants of consumption,poverty, growth,and inequality in Bangladesh

Using in a consistent way the household level data of five successive national surveys, this paper analyses at once the microdeterminants (and changes thereof) of consumption, poverty, growth, and inequality in Bangladesh from 1983 to 1996. Education, demographics, land ownership, occupation, and geographic location all affect consumption and poverty. The gains in per capita consumption associated with many of these household characteristics tend to be stable over time. Demographics have had the largest impact on growth. Education (in urban areas) and land (in rural areas) contribute the most to measures of conditional between group inequality, a new concept introduced in the paper to avoid the pitfalls of traditional group decompositions of the Gini index, followed by location in both sectors.     

IMPACT OF GROWTH AND DISTRIBUTION ON POVERTY IN MADAGASCAR

Poverty in Madagascar has increased between 1962 and 1980 both in the rural and urban areas based on a comparison of some poverty measures, but decreased based on others. However, it remains predominantly a rural phenomenon. Distributional inequality is the major determinant of the variation in rural poverty, while the changes in urban poverty are due to the lack of economic growth. Thus, the urban bias introduced in government policies in the mid-1970s was not justifiable on strictly poverty-reduction grounds. A reduction of sectoral disparities would have led to a significant reduction of aggregate poverty.     

URBAN POVERTY IN CHINA AND ITS CONTRIBUTING FACTORS, 1986–2000

Food price increases and the introduction of radical social welfare and enterprise reforms during the 1990s generated significant changes in the lives of urban households in China. During this period urban poverty increased considerably. This paper uses household level data from 1986 to 2000 to examine what determines whether households fall below the poverty line over this period and investigates how the impact of these determinants has changed through time. We find that large households and households with more nonworking members are more likely to be poor, suggesting that perhaps the change from the old implicit price subsidies, based on household size, to an explicit income subsidy, based on employment, has worsened the position of large families. Further investigation into regional poverty variation indicates that over the 1986–93 period food price increases were also a major contributing factor. Between 1994 and 2000 the worsening of the economic situation of state sector employees contributed to the poverty increase.     

贸易自由化影响农村贫困的路径与特征

城乡人口流动是当今社会最重要的经济现象,贸易自由化的影响最为显著,为此,我们运用门槛面板数据模型实证研究了贸易自由化影响我国农村贫困的路径和特征。结果发现,贸易自由化主要从经济增长、就业与工资以及物价水平路径影响农村贫困。并且,贸易自由化和农村贫困之间存在一种非线性的倒U关系,即在贸易自由化初期,贸易自由化加重了农村贫困,当贸易自由化水平越过某一门槛值时,贸易自由化有助于农村减贫。因此,继续扩大自由贸易的层次与规模,是未来农村反贫困的一个政策选项。     

GROWTH, POVERTY, AND INEQUALITY IN LATIN AMERICA: A CAUSAL ANALYSIS, 1970–94

Taking advantage of consistent poverty and income inequality data for 12 Latin American countries between 1970 and 1994, we analyze the determinants of changes in the incidence of urban and rural poverty and in Gini coefficients over spells of years, stressing in particular the role of aggregate income growth. We find that income growth reduces urban and rural poverty but not inequality. We also find that income growth is more effective in reducing urban poverty if the levels of inequality and poverty are lower, and the levels of secondary education higher. We show that there is an asymmetry in the impact of growth on poverty and inequality, with recession having strong negative effects on both poverty and inequality. Since growth does not reduce inequality, economic cycles create ratchet effects on the level of inequality. However, post-structural adjustment growth is quite effective at reducing poverty, particularly if inequality is low.     

Income Inequality in Malaysia*

The objective of this paper is to examine the changes in Malaysian income distribution during the last three and a half decades and the reasons for the changes. It was found that the Gini ratio for Malaysia peaked in 1976 and fell thereafter to 1990. However, inequality seems to reverse its direction since then. Policies that could explain the changes in income distribution include the promotion of export‐oriented industrialization, education, and training, and the restructuring of equity ownership and assistance in asset accumulation. While the various other redistributive measures in the form of rural development helped in poverty eradication, their effectiveness in redistribution needs to be improved. Several hypotheses have been forwarded to explain the widening of income inequality after 1990. These include the difference in the growth rates of incomes of the rural and urban areas, trade and globalization, and impediments to the process of internal migration.     

Disentangling the Poverty Effects of Sectoral Output,Prices, and Policies in India

This paper attempts to disentangle the poverty effects of key policy variables that directly affect the poor (namely the government‐led channel of development spending and financing) in both agricultural and non‐agricultural sectors after accounting for the effect of respective sectoral per capita income and prices, using data from India over five decades. The paper emphasizes the sectoral composition of income and prices as mechanisms influencing the level of poverty and establishes empirically that it is the rise in non‐agricultural per capita income that reduces rural poverty via the channel of internal migration, after having controlled for the variation in key components of fiscal spending and monetary/financial policy via the availability of credit. Uneven sectoral growth pattern explains why urban poverty becomes a spill‐over of persistent rural poverty when the agricultural sector shrinks. While checking for robustness, there is evidence that the rise in non‐agricultural income alone may not reduce rural poverty, when measured in terms of rural infant mortality rate as a non‐income indicator of well‐being.     

The challenge of rural financial inclusion – evidence from microfinance

Financial inclusion is said to foster development and growth. However, progress in financial inclusion has been slow in rural areas where poverty is most pronounced. This is often attributed to higher transaction costs, higher risks and a more unfavourable contracting environment which makes it more difficult for financial institutions to achieve and maintain sustainability in rural compared to urban areas. Based on data covering 772 microfinance institutions (MFIs) over the period 2008–2013, we test whether rural financial inclusion, notably lending to rural borrowers, is hampered by stronger sustainability challenges than inclusion in urban markets. Our results suggest that a higher share of rural borrowers has no direct effect on MFI sustainability. However, we find that MFIs with a higher share of rural borrowers are less able to exploit economies of scale and productivity effects. Thus, our results provide support for the view that sustainability challenges make it more difficult to achieve progress in financial inclusion in rural than in urban areas.     

Analysis on the disparity in economic growth and consumption between urban sector and rural sector of China: 1978–2008

This paper designs a theoretical model of excess per-capita income growth and brings forward such indices as excess per-capita income, per-capita base consumption and decreasing factor as well as the corresponding measurement methods. It studies from a brand new aspect the disparity between the economic growth in urban sector and rural sector of China in the past 30 years after the reform and opening-up, together with the disparity between the effects of such growth on consumption. The research results show that: At present the problem of the duality of urban and rural sector of China is still serious; the impaired amount of economic growth in urban sector is larger than that in rural sector while the impairing strength in rural sector is higher than that in urban sector; and it is vital to increase the excess per-capita investment in rural sector in order to effectively strengthen consumption related policies. Therefore, promoting urbanization but reasonably controlling the urbanization progress while strengthening the infrastructure construction in rural areas would be the efficient approach to reduce the impairing strength over the economic growth, to build up consumption market, to improve the duality of economy and to realize sustainable development.     

Shocks, Policy Reforms and Pro-Poor Growth in Bolivia: A Simulation Analysis

This paper analyzes how major external shocks and policy reforms affect Bolivia’s ability to achieve pro‐poor growth. Employing a recursive‐dynamic CGE model, it considers three different scenarios: an optimistic baseline scenario; a more realistic scenario that accounts for two important negative external shocks (declining capital inflows and El Niño); and a scenario that captures the combined effect of the shocks and two major reform projects (development of the gas sector and deregulation of the urban labor market). It turns out that the shocks are likely to impair Bolivia’s medium‐term development prospects, leading to marked increases in both urban and rural poverty. If the reform projects were implemented, the poverty increase caused by the shocks would be more than offset for urban households, but reinforced for rural households.     

经济增长对贫困变动的影响及影响途径分析——以新疆农村为例

以农村居民人均纯收入的增长作为经济增长,运用1988～2010年新疆农村人均纯收入分组数据,研究新疆经济增长与农村贫困变动之间的关系,并且对经济增长影响贫困变动的途径进行分析。研究结果表明,经济增长对新疆农村贫困的减少起到了显著的作用,而农业的发展和非农就业的增长是提高农民收入从而减缓农村贫困的主要途径。因此,推动农村经济增长仍然是新疆今后扶贫工作的重点。     

Rural labour market policies in Croatia,FYR of Macedonia and Turkey

Considerable differences are found among countries regarding the importance of the agricultural labour force, between rural and urban labour, and in poverty and living conditions in rural areas. Declines in the agricultural labour force and rural population are foreseen for each of the countries, but with significant variations between them. Showing different patterns over time, labour market developments in the sector and in rural areas have been shaped by the overall labour market institutions, conditions and factors in each country, such as the legal basis, educational attainment and migration flows, and the presence of non-agricultural activities in rural areas.     

中国的政府公共支出与减贫政策

在中国 ,尽管农村经济增长和贫困减少取得了长足进展 ,但很少有研究对农村经济的动力源进行分析 ,而把公共投资作为农村发展和消除贫困的直接动力源的研究尤其缺乏。本文旨在弥补以前研究的空白 ,并指出各类公共投资对农村经济增长、贫困减少和地区不均等的边际效应在各地区和各时期差别很大。根据实证结果和对历史上公共支出方式的分析可知 ,农村公共支出再分配可以带来很大的潜在收益。     

经济增长、收入分配与贫困——对新疆农村居民贫困变动的实证分析

通过运用FGT贫困指数和在Lorenz曲线基础上的贫困指示增长曲线对新疆农村最近几年的贫困变动进行研究。研究结果表明,从2003年到2007年,经济增长减缓了新疆农村的贫困状况,但收入分配状况的恶化在一定程度上抵消了经济增长减缓贫困的积极作用。除2003～2004年以外,其余时期的经济增长都不是亲贫式的增长,新疆农村的贫困人口在经济增长中获得的利益少于非贫困人口。因此,为了有效地减少贫困,新疆不仅要注重通过经济增长减少贫困规模,同时也要重视缩小收入分配差距,并且把减少收入分配不均等的重点要放在提高最贫困人口的收入水平上。     

Structural Change and Economic Growth in China

This study develops a new analytical framework to account for sources of rapid economic growth in China. The traditional Solow approach is expanded to include another source of economic growth—structural change. The empirical results show that structural change has contributed to growth significantly by reallocating resources from low‐productivity sectors to high‐productivity sectors. It is found that the returns to capital investment in both agricultural production and rural enterprises are much higher than those in urban sectors, indicating underinvestment in rural areas. On the other hand, labor productivity in the agricultural sector remains low, a result of the still large surpluses of labor in the sector. Therefore, further development of rural enterprises and an increase in labor flow among sectors and across regions are key to improvements in overall economic efficiency.     

“五普”至“六普”期间中国城镇人口的增长构成

利用2000年和2010年的全国人口普查资料、2005年全国1%人口抽样调查资料以及国家统计局公布的相关人口数据,对第五次人口普查和第六次人口普查期间中国城镇人口的增长构成进行了估算。在"五普"至"六普"期间中国城镇人口的增长构成发生了很大的变化,具体表现在人口从农村向城镇的迁移已成为中国城镇人口增长的主要来源。在面临中国城镇人口增长模式发生深刻变革的时候,中国亟需解决的问题是从政策和制度层面为从农村转移到城镇的人口的就业、住房、医疗、教育和社会保障等创造良好的条件,使他们在城镇里安居乐业,从而巩固人口迁移对中国城市化的贡献,使中国的城市化顺利发展。     

Poverty,inequality and growth in Albania

This article studies the distribution of well‐being and, specifically, the degree of poverty and deprivation in Albania, in the years 2002 and 2005, using Living Standard Measurement Surveys (LSMS). The distribution analysis is performed by applying both one‐dimensional and multidimensional approaches, in particular to better examine the link between economic growth, inequality and poverty in Albania. Furthermore, by estimating a non‐monetary indicator, as proposed by Bossert et al. ( 2007 ), and a nonlinear principal component model together with a probit model, the paper focuses on the multidimensional measures of poverty to address the relationship between poverty and socio‐economic factors. Our evidence shows that absolute poverty decreased from 2002 to 2005 while national relative poverty increased; economic growth reduced poverty in Albania over the observed period; and living in rural and mountain areas, being female, poorly educated and with a large family increased the probability of suffering from deprivation.     

二元财政的制度变迁：基于路径依赖的视角

植根于二元经济结构的二元财政制度总是执行有利于城镇部门发展，而且有损于农业部门发展的财政税收政策。这不仅造成了农村居民的长期贫困，而且还持续拉大城乡差距。基于新制度经济学的制度变迁分析结果显示，二元财政的制度安排内含自我增强机制，其变迁具有明显的路径依赖特征，所以，农村居民的贫困必然具有长期性，城乡差距也会持续拉大。因此，必须根据中国经济现实，对二元财政制度采取边际调整的改革措施和借助市场化的手段改善其赖以存在的经济环境，方可在长期内从整体上推动二元财政制度变迁，实现城乡平等的财政制度。     

A Gini decomposition analysis of inequality in the Czech and Slovak Republics during the transition1

Disposable income inequality, as measured by the Gini coefficient and using the Family Budget Survey data, increased very little, and by a similar amount, from 1989 to 1993 in the Czech Republic and Slovakia. This surprising result is examined with an analysis of changes in the channels of redistribution and Gini decomposition. We find that the sizeable increase in overall inequality due to changes in the wage earnings component is mitigated by changes in the tax and transfer components in both republics. As for the relative effects of government policies, changes in the transfer component contributed more than changes in the tax component to lowering the growth of inequality in the Czech Republic, while the reverse was true for Slovakia.