Decomposing Income Inequality and Policy Implications in Rural China

Using village data from samples covering 6 provinces,36 counties and 216 townships,the income inequalities within and between townships in rural China are assessed. The Theil index and the mean logarithmic deviation methods enable us to test income inequality at the township level,and to decompose it into intra-regional and inter-regional at county and provincial levels. In the present paper,we also decompose income inequalities between and within the nationally designated poor counties (NDPC). The results show that approximately two-thirds of the income inequality in rural China would be eliminated if measures and policies were targeted at the county level. This study also confirms the rationale that China's poverty alleviation strategy of focusing on poor counties based on the inequalities between NDPC and non-NDPC accounts for the most inter-province inequality.     

Which indicator of income distribution explains crime better? Evidence from China

Income distribution is perceived to affect crime (Becker 1968; Thurow 1971; Merlo 2003). Consequently, economists have been modeling crime employing inequality indicators as one of the explanatory variables, yielding mixed results. This paper argues that income polarization rather than inequality indicators should be used instead. Technically, in addition to income gaps that are measured by inequality indicators, the recently developed polarization index of Duclos, Esteban, and Ray (2004) also captures clustering, which implies social segregation and immobility, both potentially causing social tensions and conflicts. Thus, this polarization index is expected to be a better variable in explaining crime. To substantiate our arguments, provincial panel data from China are used to model the crime–income distribution relationship. Income polarization is found to be positively and significantly associated with crime. When both income polarization and inequality indicators are included in the models, the former remains a positive and significant determinant while the latter becomes insignificant.     

Divergence or convergence?: Income inequality between cities,towns and villages in Japan

Researchers have emphasized different aspects of income inequality, including the statistical evidence of interregional per capita income convergence (following the economic growth theory) and the increase in individual income inequality. This study clarifies these issues, by analyzing the interregional income inequality of cities, towns and villages data in Japan from 1986 to 1999. The results of this empirical analysis show that the interregional income inequality decreases in the 1990s, in spite of the increase in individual income inequality.     

人力资本、劳动收入份额与共同富裕

共同富裕目标的核心是增加居民收入和缩小居民收入差距,人力资本水平的提升能增加劳动者的收入。劳动收入份额作为收入分配的一项重要指标,有利于改善初次分配不平等,缩小收入差距,进而促进共同富裕目标的实现。利用2011—2021年中国30个省份的数据,运用固定效应、中介效应模型,实证分析人力资本对共同富裕的影响以及劳动收入份额在两者之间发挥的作用。研究发现,人力资本水平的提升能够促进共同富裕,且该结论在进行一系列稳健性检验后仍然成立;中介效应分析表明,劳动收入份额在人力资本对共同富裕的影响之间起到中介的作用;异质性分析表明,在东部和经济规模大的地区,人力资本对共同富裕的促进作用更为明显。     

Comment: On the Interpretation (and Misinterpretation) of Inequality Decompositions by Income Sources

This paper discusses interpretations of different inequality decomposition rules when inequality is decomposed by income sources. It argues that authors of a recent article based their conclusions on misinterpreted decomposition results. It also argues that marginal effects, derived as elasticities of inequality with respect to uniform increases in income from each source, are easily interpreted and can be compared across different decomposition rules.     

Unemployment, Poverty and Income Disparity in Urban China

This paper studies the issues of unemployment and poverty that have been appearing recently in urban China. It estimates the urban unemployment rate, poverty rate and income disparity using a new sample survey data set. Meanwhile, it analyzes the relationship between unemployment and poverty, and the effects of poverty on urban inequality. The main findings are that: (i) the urban unemployment rate reached 11.6% in 1999 and was a major cause of urban poverty; (ii) growing urban poverty is becoming the significant source of worsening urban inequality; and (iii) migrant households have an increasing influence on urban poverty and the pattern of urban income distribution. The paper concludes that urban income distribution has worsened since 1995, and urban unemployment and poverty are the major factors in this worsening.     

我国收入分配问题研究述评

改革开放以来我国的收入差距持续扩大，收入分配问题吸引了众多学者的关注，也引发了诸多争论。本文回顾了在收入分配制度研究、“倒U”理论、收入差距测度、城乡差距和地区差距研究等几个方面产生的理论争论，并做出了简单评述。     

创新与收入不平等

文章运用1995-2014年中国省际面板数据,从部门内和部门间两个视角,考察总体创新和产业创新水平对收入不平等的影响。实证结果表明不同类型的创新活动对收入不平等产生了不同影响：对于城镇居民收入不平等,总体创新水平和高新技术创新水平具有显著的扩大作用,创新带来了不同收入阶层内部的分化;对于农村居民收入不平等,农业创新水平具有显著的缩小作用,显示出农业创新对农民增收的积极作用;对于城乡收入差距,总体创新水平和农业创新水平具有缩小作用,而高新技术产业创新水平具有显著扩大作用。不仅如此,由于城乡收入差距存在显著的正向空间自相关,总体创新和高新技术产业创新对相邻地区城乡收入差距有显著的扩大作用。     

Village Elections,Accountability and Income Distribution in Rural China

1. Introduction The village election was first envisioned by the late chairman of the National People’sCongress (NPC), Mr Peng Zhen, in the mid-1980s to enhance village governance after the commune system was dissolved in China in the early 1980s. In 1987, the NPC passed a tentative version of The Organic Law of the Village Committee (OLVC), and started a 10 year experiment of village elections. In 1998, the NPC formally passed the law and elections quickly spread to the whole count…     

中国农村收入不平等—基于微观调查数据的回归分解

论文利用2003-2008年CGSS的微观个体调查数据,运用回归分解方法对中国农村收入不平等进行分解。首先对收入不平等进行测算,研究发现农村收入极端不平等,并且呈上升趋势。回归分解结果表明,年龄、教育、性别、东部地区虚拟变量、政治地位、婚姻、健康和幸福感是对农村收入不平等的决定要素。其中教育、年龄、性别、东部地区虚拟变量和健康对农村收入不平等的贡献显著。其余变量对农村收入不平等的贡献相对较小,但其对农村收入不平等的影响也不能被忽视。研究结论对政府制定科学合理的收入分配政策和有效调控收入差距具有借鉴作用。     

The Impact of Personal Income Tax Structure on Income Inequality for Belgium,Bulgaria, Germany,Lithuania, and Poland: A Comparison of Flat and Graduated Income Tax Structures

The level of income inequality in a country is usually a contentious and politically divisive issue. How the tax structure affects this inequality is of crucial concern to policymakers. In this paper, we examine the income tax experiences of five European Union countries: Belgium, Bulgaria, Germany, Lithuania, and Poland. This paper focuses on the comparison between flat and graduated personal income tax rate structures. Various methods were used to measure the progressivity of income taxes across these countries such as the average tax rate, cumulative shares of income, and the Gini and other indices. The findings show that the graduated rate income tax structure of Germany and Belgium are the most effective at reducing inequality. On the other hand, Lithuania’s proportional income tax structure is much more effective at reducing income inequality when compared to the graduated rate structure of Poland. Also, an appropriately-sized income tax threshold can transform a flat structure to a redistributive one that compares favorably with some graduated rate structures. In the case of Bulgaria, introducing an income tax threshold that is roughly the size of average income would reduce inequality by about 4 %.

     

教育、健康与农村居民收入差距

人力资本和收入差距关系一直是经济研究中的热点问题,作为人力资本的重要因素,教育和健康对我国农村居民收入差距的扩大起到了关键性的作用,而初始收入差距的存在必然会影响到居民对教育和健康的投资,从而产生人力资本差距,进而对收入差距产生重大影响。文章对相关的文献进行梳理和评述,并对其相互影响的机制进行了探讨和总结。     

Income inequality in central Spain, 1690–1800

This paper studies the evolution of income inequality in central Spain during the late seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, taking as case study the province of Guadalajara. The first part of the paper presents the sources and the dataset that was created to estimate income inequality using grain tithes. The second section shows that through the period grain represented the lion share of total income and therefore that it can be used as a reliable proxy. The following part of the paper introduces an analysis of income inequality in the province during the period 1690–1800 and concludes that inequality decreased during the last third of the eighteenth century. Finally the paper addresses this unexpected result and concludes that it was consequence of the success of the land reform carried out by the central government in the late 1760s. The reform was a success in Guadalajara, thanks to the characteristics of its population and the lack of bargaining power of pressure groups.     

Income mobility in a high-inequality society: Evidence from the first two waves of the National Income Dynamics Study

The study of income inequality and income mobility has been central to understanding post-apartheid South Africa's development. This paper uses the first two waves of the National Income Dynamics Study to analyse income mobility using longitudinal data, and is the first to do so at a nationally representative level. We investigate both the correlates and root causes of moving up and down the income distribution over time. Using both absolute and relative changes as reference points, we highlight some of the factors associated with South Africans moving into and out of poverty.     

China＇s New Rural Income Support Policy： Impacts on Grain Production and Rural Income Inequality

I. Introduction Since the beginning of 2004, the Chinese Government has replaced its centuries-old policy of taxing agriculture by a new policy aimed at subsidizing agriculture and stimulating rural incomes. To this end, agricultural taxes – standing at around 8 percent of agricultural incomes – were drastically reduced. By now they are abolished in most provinces. Inaddition, farmers growing grain receive a direct income subsidy, new seed varieties and mechanization are subsidized, and la…     

Chinese dialects,culture & economic performance

In this paper, we explore the relationship between dialectal and cultural diversity and the effects of dialectal diversity on economic performance by drawing evidence from the Chinese Family Panel Study (CFPS) and Chinese prefecture-level cities. We find that dialectal diversity is a proxy for cultural diversity in China. We compute five indices of Chinese dialectal diversity: 1. Dialectal fractionalization; 2. Adjusted dialectal fractionalization; 3. Dialectal polarization; 4. Adjusted dialectal polarization and 5. Periphery heterogeneity. Dialectal fractionalization and dialectal polarization have a positive effect on both income per capita and economic growth. Adjusted dialectal fractionalization and periphery heterogeneity exhibit a positive effect on economic growth. The effect if robust when considering the influence of Putonghua proficiency and external migration. Our analysis also shows that dialectal diversity promotes economic performance through increasing public expenditure.     

农产品价格变动对农民收入的影响研究

文章基于2004—2008年的省际面板数据,采用动态面板模型的GMM方法,实证检验农产品价格变动对农民收八的影响。实证结果发现,由于农业收入在农民收入来源中比重下降,以及农业生产成本提高和投机因素的存在,农民并没有从农产品价格上涨中显著获益,农产品价格上涨未能显著带动农民收入提高。而农民的打工收入,尤其是通过加工贸易出口获取非农就业机会实现的非农收入,是农民收入增长的显著推动力量。     

Income Inequality,Taxation, and Growth

Much recent theoretical and empirical research has focused on the relationship between income distribution and economic growth. The fiscal policy approach argues that inequality is linked to pressure for redistributionary taxation, leading to low capital investment and, therefore, growth. Empirical analyses are consonant with this view in that the long-run relationship between inequality and growth is negative. However, several empirical inconsistencies with the fiscal policy approach do emerge: (a) there exists a short-run, positive relationship between income inequality and growth and (b) the relationship between inequality and taxation is mixed, at best. This paper presents a simple theoretical model that reconciles the intuitively appealing fiscal policy approach with the empirical findings.     

ETHNIC DIVERSITY,PROPERTY RIGHTS,AND NATURAL RESOURCES

Countries rich in natural resources constitute both development failures and successes depending on their underlying socioeconomic fundamentals. Recent empirical evidence and theoretical work provide support for a resource-curse hypothesis based on ethnic fractionalization. There is also increasing empirical evidence suggesting that ethnic heterogeneity based on polarization is a strong deterrent of economic growth. In this paper, we explore the interlinkages between natural resource abundance and both measures of ethnic heterogeneity. In a two–simultaneous equation system, we assess the effects of fractionalization and polarization on property-rights protection, and thereby on growth, both directly as well as in interaction with our resource-abundance proxy. We find that ethnic polarization is more likely to have a direct negative impact on the effectiveness of property rights in a resource-rich context, which as we explain may suggest that different ethnic groups treat the contestable resource base as a semi-public good.     

产品内国际分工对收入分配的影响研究

产品内国际分工的发展对参与分工各国的收入分配产生了重要的影响,文章利用中国省级面板数据研究产品内国际分工时我国收入分配的影响.从全国层面角度的分析显示,产品内国际分工显著导致收入分配恶化,在针对中国不同地区的实证研究表明,东中西部地区在参与产品内国际分工的过程中,产品内国际分工对于收入分配的影响方向一致,但是呈现东中西逐渐减弱的态势.在此基础上,验证了产品内国际分工对于收入分配的影响呈现倒“U”曲线特征,实证结果表明当前中国的产品内国际分工的收入分配效应处于倒“U”曲线的上升阶段.