收入不平等、政策偏向与最优财政再分配政策

本文构建的理论模型探讨了收入不平等、政策偏向与最优财政再分配之间的关系。模型显示:政策偏向是收入不平等与财政再分配恶性循环的决定因素。当政策偏向于穷人时,最优财政再分配系统的选择是提高税率,扩大对穷人的转移支付;当政策偏向于富人时,最优财政再分配系统的选择是降低税率,减少对穷人的转移支付。依据中国数据的实证研究发现:(1)中国收入不平等不断恶化,针对恶化的不平等而采取的财政再分配政策效果差,没能扭转不平等恶化趋势,政策偏向严重。(2)税收再分配政策偏向富人,使富人税负相对轻于穷人,居民收入不平等加剧;偏向于穷人的转移支付多为消费券(物),导致越扶越贫。为此,需要从调整所得税和转移支付政策等方面采取相关对策。     

再分配倾向的决定:对既有文献的考察

本文对再分配倾向决定领域的既有文献进行详尽考察,认为从内在动力角度来理解各种决定因素才是根本,归纳提炼了再分配倾向决定的四大动机:经济利益动机、风险规避动机、公平信念动机和声誉理想动机。再分配倾向决定的四大动机通过不尽相同的理论逻辑机制和多种实证影响因素对人们的再分配倾向产生影响,四大动机的框架为实证研究中的因素筛选提供了有力的工具。对于该领域进一步的研究,本文提出应用实验手段的重要性,并应注意宏观变量对再分配倾向的内生性影响。     

Market Demand Elasticity and Income Inequality

This paper deals with the analysis of the relation between aggregate demand for a consumption good and the distribution of income across consumers. We obtain sufficient conditions under which changes in income inequality lead to an increase or decrease in the market demand elasticities. The conditions are satisfied for individual demand functions commonly used in economic models, in particular, for the typical demand functions on luxury goods and necessities. An earlier version of this paper was titled “Market demand elasticity, equilibrium stability and income inequality”. The authors are grateful to an anonymous referee, Aydin Cecen and Herbert Scarf for helpful comments and suggestions. R. Ibragimov gratefully acknowledges the financial support from the Yale Graduate Fellowship and the Cowles Foundation Prize.     

Inequality of opportunity in earnings and assets in Egypt

ABSTRACT

By most available measures, the level of inequality in the MENA region, including Egypt, is considered relatively low. This regularity applies to both inequality of outcomes as well as inequality of opportunity. This paper challenges this view. It argues specifically that circumstances beyond the control of individuals account for a larger share of inequality of opportunity when asset distribution is considered rather than the distribution of earnings, essentially because earnings are subject to measurement errors and idiosyncratic shocks. The paper tests this proposition by estimating the extent to which factors related to the circumstances a person is born into contribute to inequality of opportunity in earnings as well as asset ownership. The results show that circumstances account 26–32% of inequality of asset distribution, compared with only 8–10% of inequality of opportunity in earnings. The analysis further shows that the area of birth and fathers education level are the two most important circumstance factors contributing to inequality of opportunity, for both assets and earnings.     

收入不平等对人口健康影响的研究综述

自1970年代以来,西方学者从理论假设和实证研究两个角度对收入不平等对于人口健康产生的影响进行了深入而广泛的研究,采用跨国数据进行的研究基本上证实了收入不平等对于人口健康产生的不利影响,而采用跨地区数据以及个人数据进行的研究得出的结论则不尽一致.本文主要从理论假设、实证研究和影响途径三个角度对收入不平等对于人口健康的相关研究进行梳理和归纳,以期对我国的相关研究有所启示.     

Household Debt,Consumption, and Income Inequality

Using the Johansen and Engle–Granger cointegration tests, we show that there is one cointegrating relationship between household debt, consumption, and income inequality in the United States for the period from 1929 to 2009. Given this result, we use a Vector Error-Correction model to further understand the dynamics among the three variables. Results indicate that increases in income inequality and consumption directly contribute to increases in household debt. Interestingly, the results reveal some feedback from household debt to income inequality. We also show that debt-driven consumption should be viewed with caution as the results show that increases in household debt correspond with future declines in the rate of consumption.     

Household Income Inequality and Income Mobility: Implications Towards Equalizing Longer-Term Incomes in India

This paper addresses three important questions. First, what are the trends, levels and sources of income inequality in India? Second, how have been the patterns of income mobility? And finally, exploring the relationship between income mobility and income inequality in the context of India. Results, based on recent India Human Development Survey (IHDS) longitudinal data, advocate that not only is income inequality very high, nonetheless, it has increased – mainly attributable to different income sources – in India. The paper also focused on whether or not this income mobility equalizes longer-term incomes. Results suggest income mobility has resulted in-albeit not robust- equalizing longer-term incomes. Thus, based on imperative findings, the paper suggests, the nature of longer-term well-being is crucial to designing policy interventions to effectively tackle inequality and in this context, economic mobility can be seen as an avenue to long-term equality.     

The Effect of Better Information on Income Inequality

We consider an OLG economy with endogenous investment in human capital. Heterogeneity in individual human capital levels is modelled by a distribution of innate ability across agents. This distribution is common knowledge but, at young age, no agent knows his/her ability. The production of human capital depends on each individual’s investment in education. This investment decision is taken only after observing a signal which is correlated to his/her true ability, and which is used for updating beliefs. Thus, a better information system affects the distribution of human capital in each generation. Assuming separable and identical preferences for all individuals, we derive the following results in equilibrium: (a) If the relative measure of risk aversion is less (more) than 1 then more information raises (reduces) income inequality. (b) When a risk sharing market is available better information results in higher inequality regardless of the measure risk aversion. We are grateful to Alex Cukierman, Zvi Eckstein, Yona Rubinstein and Daniel Tsiddon. An anonymous referee made extremely useful comments and suggestions. Financial support from the German-Israeli Foundation for Scientific Research and Development (GIF) is gratefully acknowledged.     

Inclusive institutions,unequal outcomes: Democracy,state capacity,and income inequality

Although the relationship between democratic rule and income inequality has received important attention in recent literature, the evidence has been far from conclusive. In this paper, we explore whether the redistributive effect of democratic rule is conditional on state capacity. Previous literature has outlined that pre-existing state capacity may be necessary for inequality-reducing policies under democratic rule. In contrast to that intuitive view, this study argues that democratic rule and high state capacity combined produce higher levels of income inequality over time. This relationship operates through the positive effect of high-capacity democratic context on foreign direct investment and financial development. By making use of a novel measure of state capacity based on cumulative census administration, we find empirical support for these claims using fixed-effects panel regressions with the data from 126 industrial and developing countries between 1970 and 2013.     

收入分配不平等、有效需求与经济增长——一个基于中国经济转型期的实证研究

本文从有效需求角度入手,探究中国经济转型期经济增长与收入分配不平等之间的关系,并运用中国1978-2005年间28个省市的面板数据,通过面板数据单位根检验、协整检验与误差修正模型,对中国经济增长与收入分配不平等、有效需求、劳动力、投资、教育以及收入分配不平等和有效需求交互影响之间的长期关系和短期关系进行了研究。结果显示,中国经济转型期经济增长与收入分配不平等、有效需求具有长期的均衡关系,收入分配不平等通过有效需求机制阻碍了经济增长,且在短期内效果也非常显著。     

中央银行独立性、收入不平等与通货膨胀--来自中国的实证检验

本文就中国人民银行独立性、收入不平等对通货膨胀的影响机制进行了分析探讨.我们引入中央银行目标函数,对中央银行独立性、收入不平等与通货膨胀间的作用机制进行了模型推理分析.而后我们整合了转型国家中央银行独立性的测度方法,并用此方法对中国人民银行的独立性进行了详细测定.最后,通过计量分析检验了以下结论:收入不平等是引致通货膨胀的一个经验性因素;中央银行独立性越强,越能有效抑制收入不平等引起的通货膨胀.     

Education policy and inequality: A political economy approach

Regression results show that more unequal societies tend to spend comparatively more on higher levels of education. In a two-period model with heterogeneous agents, this paper investigates the political determinants of this bias. In the first period, public education is financed by the incumbent government by issuing bonds. Investments in basic and higher education have conflicting effects on future labour income distribution and net returns to these investments depend on the tax and transfers system being selected in the following period through the democratic process. Our idea is that public investment in basic education, by decreasing future labour income inequality, may induce future policy-makers to redistribute resources through financial rents taxation, thus making unfeasible the issuing of debt to finance basic education. This will be the more probable the greater wealth inequality is.     

Inequality and credit growth in Russian regions

We test the Rajan hypothesis using data for Russian regions from 2000 (after the ruble crisis) to 2012 (before the introduction of international sanctions). The Rajan hypothesis predicts that rising income inequality leads politicians to expand credit for the poor, which in turn, fuels a consumer credit boom. Russia provides a unique research opportunity becaise it is a post-communist transition country with 75 diverse regions. We find that a rise in income inequality is positively correlated with personal loan growth in Russia. We also find a statistically weaker, albeit economically larger, relationship between economic inequality and corporate credit. Taken together, our results provide support for the Rajan hypothesis in a country with extreme regional differences and a long history of populist policies.     

Political capitalism: The interaction between income inequality,economic freedom and democracy

We study the relationship between income inequality and economic freedom for a panel of 100 countries for the 1971–2010 period. Using a panel Granger non-causality approach, we reject the null hypothesis of Granger non-causality running from income inequality to economic freedom, but not vice versa. From a series of dynamic panel estimations we show that the effect of income inequality on economic freedom is negative and robust to the inclusion of additional controls. In particular, inequality is negatively associated with those components of economic freedom related to international trade, domestic market regulation as well as the rule of law and property rights protection. We argue that the negative effect of inequality on economic freedom is due to the economic elite converting its economic power into de facto political power to defend its economic interests; these interests run counter to economic freedom, discouraging innovation and competition as well as protecting the elite's rents. Finally, we show that economic freedom decreases with income inequality even in democratic countries, suggesting that democratic institutions do not prevent economic freedom from eroding. We argue that the latter finding corresponds to a system of political capitalism or captured democracy, where a powerful economic elite can nevertheless exercise de facto political power by cooperating with politicians and other decision-makers for their mutual benefit.     

A political economy perspective on persistent inequality,inflation, and redistribution

In this paper we examine the dynamics of the link between inequality and inflation from a political economy perspective. We consider a simple dynamic general equilibrium model in which agents vote over the desired inflation rate in each period, and inequality is persistent. Inflation in our model is a mechanism of redistribution, and we find that the link between inequality and inflation within any period or over time depends on institutional and preference related parameters. Furthermore, we find that differences in the initial distributions of wealth can yield a diverse set of patterns for the evolution of the inflation and inequality link. Relative to existing literature, our model leads to more precise predictions about the inflation–inequality correlation. To that end, results in the extant empirical literature on the inflation and inequality link need to be interpreted with caution.     

中国居民收入差距对消费倾向变动趋势的影响

本文以消费的边际效用递减规律为基础,探讨了居民收入差距和消费倾向间可能的关系,并对中国居民消费倾向变动趋势进行解释.本文分析表明,收入差距对消费倾向可能的影响和经济发展水平有关系,当经济发展到一定程度时,居民收入差距在一定的范围内变化不会影响消费倾向的变化,但超过一定范围后,随着收入差距变大,消费倾向变低.我们认为过大的居民收入差距是造成近年来消费倾向变低的重要原因.     

收入、收入不均与健康:城乡差异和职业地位的影响

本文使用来自中国9个省的微观面板数据,检验了居民自评健康与家庭人均收入和社区内收入不均之间的相关关系。考虑到中国城乡分割的二元经济社会特征,本文将农村样本和城镇样本分开处理;考虑到中国的社会分层结构,计量方程中引入了代表职业地位的变量及其与收入和收入不均的交互项。在实证结果的基础上,本文讨论了收入、收入不均与健康关系的作用机制。主要结论是:收入与健康的关系、收入不均与健康的关系都存在城乡差异和职业差异,这说明在收入、收入不均与健康的关系中,社会经济地位的影响十分重要。要解决健康不平等问题,关键在于加强对社会经济地位较低者,主要是农村居民和生活在城镇的农民的医疗保障,同时要设法改善农村的基础设施和社会资本,并逐步取消各种造成城乡分割的制度。     

机会不均等:收入分配失衡的经济学解析

改革开放以来,我国经济社会发展取得了巨大的成就,然而,伴随着经济增长,收入差距的不断扩大,分配不公现象日益严峻.本文分析了收入分配差距存在的合理性,审视了当前我国收入分配的状况及特征,在此基础上提出机会不均等是收入差距产生的根本原因,必须深化收入分配制度改革,才能从根本上解决收入分配不公的问题.     

人力资本不平等与人力资本投资的生育率机制--基于面板数据联立方程模型的分析

人力资本不平等对人力资本投资有着重要的影响。分析了人力资本不平等通过生育率影响人力资本投资的机制。通过构建面板数据联立方程模型对我国省际数据的实证研究,发现人力资本不平等与人力资本投资之间存在很强的负相关。实证结果表明,当其他条件都相同时人力资本不平等程度越高的地区居民的生育率越高,而高生育率反过来阻碍人力资本投资,即生育率机制是显著的。     

Political ideology and the intragenerational prospect of upward mobility

We re-examine the effect of prospects of upward mobility (POUM) on the support for redistribution. Unlike previous studies, we analyse this relation in an intragenerational context and consider the moderating effect of political ideology through which mobility expectations affect redistributive preferences. We find that the POUM effect is conditional on political preferences. That is, we find that only for right-wing individuals expected upward income mobility negatively affects support for redistribution. Left-wing individuals prefer redistribution, regardless of expected upward income movements.