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Globalization, Poverty and Income Inequality: Insights from Indonesia: Edited by Richard Barichello, Arianto A. Patunru and Richard Schwindt. He also does not distinguish between Gini coefficients based on household income and those based on household expenditures; Indonesian estimates are usually based on expenditure figures, which are not directly comparable with other countries in Asia, let alone the OECD countries. Trade openness may well have increased less rapidly in Indonesia than in China, India and Vietnam since 1980, but in 1980 these three last economies were still largely closed to global trade. [Extracted from the article]

This paper empirically identifies three types of entrepreneurs in the Congolese informal sector, namely top-performers, constrained gazelles and survivalists. Based on logit and fixed effect OLS models, the paper finds that poverty and income inequality are more common among constrained gazelles and survivalists. Results also show that income inequality is explained mainly by educational disparities and lack of credit access among entrepreneurs. The outcomes of a Blinder-Oaxaca decomposition show that the performance of firms is a key factor in explaining differences in income. Moreover, the paper finds that human capital and managerial skills are important engines of performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the complex relationship between energy poverty and the maintenance of democratic values within the European Union (EU), suggesting that energy poverty not only impacts economic stability and health outcomes but also poses significant challenges to democratic engagement and equity. To measure energy poverty, a composite index is developed using the entropy method, which surpasses traditional measures focused solely on access to energy or its developmental implications. To assess the level of democratic governance in EU countries, the voice and accountability index (VEA), which is part of the World Governance Indicators compiled by the World Bank, is utilized. By analyzing EU data from 2006 to 2022, the findings suggest that a 1% improvement in VEA quality, represented by a coefficient of 0.122, is correlated with a notable improvement in the energy poverty index. This suggests that the EU should focus on enhancing transparency and public participation in energy decision-making, along with ensuring accountability in policy implementation. The research also differentiates between full and flawed democracies, noting that tailored approaches are needed. In full democracies, leveraging economic prosperity and trade is crucial due to their significant positive impacts on the energy poverty index. In contrast, in flawed democracies, enhancing governance and accountability is more impactful, as evidenced by a higher coefficient of 0.193. Strengthening legal and regulatory frameworks, improving regulatory quality, and ensuring public engagement in governance could substantially mitigate energy poverty in these contexts. In addition, this paper demonstrates that this relationship is influenced by factors such as income inequality, energy intensity, and trade openness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This paper examines the impact of financial inclusion on poverty through access to mobile money in developing economies. Design/methodology/approach: The authors employ the principal component analysis to construct an index of financial inclusion using demand and supply indicators, including mobile accounts. The authors use the two-step system GMM estimator for the analysis because of its efficiency and robustness in addressing heteroscedasticity and autocorrelation. Findings: The main finding is that financial inclusion generally increased and significantly reduces poverty in the sample period. Furthermore, income inequality worsens poverty. Research limitations/implications: This study has few limitations. First, the empirical analysis of the study is restricted to macroeconomic factors only because of limited Household Finance Survey data set and time availability. Second, the study is limited to developing countries and the results cannot be generalized. Practical implications: Financial inclusion is a significant policy tool for poverty reduction. There is the need to enhance strategies that further improve financial inclusion by expanding and improving the use of mobile money accounts. Social implications: The paper sheds light on how developing countries can harness financial inclusion to reduce poverty. Originality/value: The paper differs from the previous studies in two ways. Firstly, mobile money account is included in the computation of financial inclusion index over the sample period. It also determines the impact of financial inclusion on poverty for short-run and long-run periods. Peer review: The peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/IJSE-11-2021-0690 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Redistribution for income equality is a contentious issue, with advocates citing increased economic stability and skeptics fearing potential negative impacts on economic growth. The United States (U.S.) faces notably high income inequality compared to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) average, with wealth concentrated in the top brackets. This paper critically examines the existing U.S. redistribution methods, including the taxation system and welfare programs, highlighting challenges such as the lack of tax progressiveness in top brackets and limited redistribution compared to European counterparts. Based on this overview, the study evaluates alternative redistribution strategies, including wealth and business taxes. The paper compares theory with insights from pilot programs in other countries. Finally, the paper argues for a universal basic income (UBI) set at per-capita welfare spending, positing that this approach can empower individuals to escape poverty traps, enhance productivity, and introduce a choice mechanism for welfare consumption. Ultimately, this research seeks to propose the most effective and feasible income redistribution policies for the U.S. to bridge the income inequality gap. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper studies the relationship between poverty levels, per capita incomes and inequality by using a large sample of low and middle-income nations. The results, which indicate the requirement of a per capita income that is close to the one currently registered in Mexico for poverty removal, are used to predict the year of the "happy event" of poverty eradication in India. The tentative finding is that the portals to a better material life for the people of India may gradually open only in the early 2040. It is also observed that some countries like Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan have succeeded in poverty removal at low per capita income levels, which may be attributed to greater success in removing inequality and to praiseworthy performance in the realm of non-monetary indicators of poverty. The paper is, of course, based on some important rational assumptions such as absence of any other major shock such as Covid-19, and the continuous average increase in India's GDP by 8%. Therefore, this is an exercise in rationality with the absence of major external positive or negative shocks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper examines the effect of trade openness on poverty using the panel Autoregressive Distributive Lag (ARDL) estimation technique from 1980 to 2019 in Southern African Development Community (SADC) countries. The paper focuses on non-income poverty; in this paper, non-income poverty is measured by the human development index since this measure looks at poverty beyond just income. The paper assesses the direct and indirect effects by including the mediating variables in the non-income poverty trade openness model. The study results assist SADC governments and policymakers in addressing poverty reduction policies amid the trade openness era and identifying appropriate complementary policies for reducing poverty in SADC countries. The study's findings indicate that trade openness reduces non-income poverty (NPOV) in SADC countries in the long run. Again, the empirical results suggest that trade openness reduces NPOV when economic growth and human capital development are high. Yet, trade openness worsens NPOV when income inequality increases. Surprisingly an inconsistent result indicates that a mediating variable of trade openness and financial development has a negative effect on NPOV in SADC countries. This calls for SADC governments and policymaking institutions to revamp the trade opening reform by making economic growth sustainable and inclusive, improving the education system's quality, maintaining income distribution, and making pro-poor financial systems across the region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Eliminating energy poverty is not only a prerequisite for escaping the "energy poverty trap" but also crucial to enhancing the welfare of residents and realising ecological civilization. Income inequality has become an essential challenge affecting China's economic growth and social stability. By integrating Chinese household data for 2016, 2018, and 2020, a mixed-method approach of energy income response modeling, income inequality measurement modeling, and fixed panel modeling is used in this paper to explore the relationship between income inequality and household energy poverty. Further, the mechanism of income inequality on energy poverty and the poverty reduction effect of household income on energy poverty are explored. The results show that income inequality is significantly and positively correlated with household energy poverty, implying that widening income inequality leads to energy "poverty enhancement." In terms of mechanisms, income inequality increases energy poverty by increasing households' willingness to save and reducing energy consumption. The moderating effect analysis shows that the breadth of digital financial inclusion reduces the contribution of income inequality to household energy poverty. The increase in household income will increase the affordability of households, especially the increase in wage income and property income, which can help households lift themselves out of "energy poverty." Therefore, creating sustainable digital ecosystems, incorporating sound government interventions, and providing diversified income channels are key to helping households escape energy poverty. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is ample empirical literature on the contributions of different income sources to total income inequality. In contrast, studies estimating the contributions of income sources to income poverty are scarce. This paper presents a new decomposition of the Foster–Greer–Thorbecke poverty index, based on a marginal approach previously employed to decompose income inequality. We apply these marginal decompositions to data for 15 EU countries and classify six income sources according to their impact on inequality and poverty. Our results indicate that there are significant differences in the contributions of income sources to poverty compared to their respective contributions to inequality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• The paper engages with the devastating consequences that the belated neoliberal reformation of the Greek welfare state – initiated after the 2009 economic crisis – had on income inequality and poverty. • It is argued that these reformations rely on the manner with which Greece has developed its relations within the global – mostly European – capitalist division of labor as a peripheral economy. Greece's economic affairs are approached as intimately conditioned by a multifaceted institutional structure of dependencies that outstrips its ability to exercise economic policy for its own interest. • Essentially built upon premises of a core-periphery dependency paradigm, the paper takes the view that since the onset of the 2008 global crisis, the EU anti-labor agenda is extended to country-members – such as Greece – which were long regarded as being poorly integrated or "lagged behind". The large-scale reformation of the Greek welfare state is exemplified and a novel interpretation of estimating the country's poverty level with attention paid to the ineffectiveness of the implemented reforms, is offered. • New estimation methods show the failure of neoliberal welfare policy in assisting even the most vulnerable members of the population, a process known as "targeting". This last part is further supported by genuine evidence drawn from several waves of microdata surveys (see Section 6) illustrating the uneven relation between Greece and the EU. • Three different measures of poverty and efficiency are presented based on original analyses of the official datasets, showing the extent of the overall income loss and the widening gap between Greece and the EU. The paper holds a critical view on EU austerity policies, with particular emphasis given to Greece. It is maintained that the main causes for the implementation of neoliberal reforms should be examined in the manner with which the Greek economy has developed in relation with the European capitalist division of labor as a peripheral economy. Greece is approached as intimately conditioned by a multifaceted institutional structure of dependencies that outstrips the country's ability to exercise economic policy for its own social interests. Essentially built upon the premises of a core-periphery dependency paradigm, the periodic post-war reconfigurations of the EU architectural design offered enough room to the formation of a stricter policy framework along these lines. By developing a set of differentiated indices on European poverty, the devastating consequences of the belated neoliberal reformation of the country's welfare state are highlighted. All calculations are based on microdata sets of EUSILC surveys. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article discusses the media's coverage of poverty and inequality, highlighting the problematic ways in which these issues are framed and explained to the public. The authors argue that media representations of poverty and inequality are ideologically laden and often contain classed, gendered, and racist assumptions. They emphasize the need for critical media analysis and rigorous research methodologies to challenge these representations. The article also provides summaries of selected papers in this special issue, which examine topics such as housing inequality, economic inequality during the pandemic, and media coverage of poverty in the United States and United Kingdom. The authors hope that these articles will contribute to a larger project of questioning hegemonic assumptions about the social world. [Extracted from the article]

In this paper we propose new multiplicative decompositions of the Foster–Greer–Thorbecke (FGT) family of poverty measures with poverty aversion parameters 3 and 4. Our decomposition results reveal that skewness (i.e., the location of the bulk of the poor in relation to the poverty line) is introduced when the poverty aversion is 3, to augment poverty incidence, poverty intensity, and inequality among the poor. When the poverty aversion parameter is 4, both skewness and kurtosis (i.e., extremities in the distribution of the incomes of the poor) are introduced. The empirical benefits of introducing skewness and kurtosis are stated and illustrated using real data derived from the 2016 Canadian census. We also propose simpler alternative multiplicative decompositions of the FGT poverty measures for which the variance of the normalized incomes of the poor, which has a fixed upper bound of 1/4, is used as the inequality measure. The fixed upper bound of the variance inequality measure is then exploited to derive the bounds of the FGT measure with a poverty aversion parameter of 2, the empirical usefulness of which is also articulated in the paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19)-induced declining economic prospects and accompanying economic shocks present socioeconomic vulnerabilities for developing economies at the tranches of poverty, unemployment and minimal social security. South Africa is one of the countries that have the most precarious societies in developing nations due to the triple challenges of unemployment, poverty and inequality. As such, this paper investigates the impact of the pandemic on South African livelihoods. Design/methodology/approach: This paper uses secondary data obtained from the National Income Dynamics Study – Coronavirus Rapid Mobile Survey (NIDS-CRAM) Wave 1 dataset to analyse the impact of COVID-19 on South African livelihoods. Findings: The findings reveal that COVID-19 amplified the country's poor and vulnerable population's socioeconomic conditions because of the stringent Level 5 lockdown regulations that barred low-income households from making a livelihood. It further revealed that low-income households, who are the least educated, Black African, female and marginalized, were disproportionally socioeconomically affected by losing the main household income. Research limitations/implications: The research is limited in that it used secondary quantitative data that relied on a telephonic survey during the COVID-19 lockdown period. Practical implications: This study offers a policy suggestion that increasing social grants during the pandemic will not have any significant impact on the livelihoods of many South Africans unless distributional inequalities are reduced. Social implications: The government needs to develop welfarist policies to protect the most vulnerable in society to limit the socioeconomic impact of pandemics and take proactive policy measures to reduce unemployment and income inequalities in the country. Originality/value: The paper contributes to understanding the precarious nature of low-income households. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the extent to which households in rural Thailand across the income distribution are able to mitigate income risks in the face of shocks. It uses especially high‐quality household income and consumption data spanning 64 Thai villages over 15 years. The paper identifies income shocks by village‐level variations during drought conditions. It finds that richer households are better able to mitigate income risk than poorer households, in contrast to some studies of the South Asian subcontinent. These possibilities for managing income risk are shown to be correlated with the type of contract the head of household is likely to be employed in, the share of salaries in total household income, the education level of the head, the relative youth of the heads of richer households, and location effects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to examine the impact of being in a specific economic position, namely, being vulnerable to poverty, on people's level of subjective well-being. Research usually focus on the top or at the bottom of the income distribution, but rarely on those in an in-between position. While the concept of poverty has been widely explored and analysed, people being vulnerable to poverty and who are struggling to maintain a certain standard of living are often neglected. This fact is probably due to the heterogeneous definition of those being vulnerable or the concept of vulnerability itself. Following the vulnerability to poverty approach, this paper estimates the effect of being in this adjacent position on the level of subjective well-being. The main hypothesis is that, people being vulnerable will report a lower level of subjective well-being compared to those in a secured position, but will be better off compared to those in poverty. Results do confirm our hypothesis, as the level of self-reported satisfaction with life is lower than the reference group for those being vulnerable to poverty, but not compared to those in poverty. However, the difference between the two groups is very small and tend to indicate similar subjective well-being. This result raise several questions and may translate how people being vulnerable to poverty feel left behind. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With exclusive property rights, community-based natural resource management (CBNRM) may provide economies of scale and scope in a joint production system. This paper examines the impact of CBNRM on poverty and inequality, using household-level panel data from Bangladesh. Results from the propensity score matching method and the random effect models reveal that project participants' employment increased by 60 person-days, and their fish income increased by 37.4%. We find a positive significant effect of the project in reducing both the incidence and depth of poverty and income inequality. The findings suggest CBNRM is an effective tool to achieve sustainable development goals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses the role of good governance in fostering pro-poor and inclusive growth. Using a sample of 112 countries over 1975-2012, it shows that growth is generally pro-poor. However, growth has not been inclusive, as illustrated by a decline in the bottom 20 percent of the income distribution. While all features of good governance support income growth and reduce poverty, only government effectiveness and the rule of law are found to enhance inclusive growth. The investigation of the determinants of pro-poor and inclusive growth highlights that education, infrastructure improvement, and financial development are the key factors in poverty reduction and inclusive growth. Relying on the panel smooth transition regression (PSTR) model, the paper identifies a nonlinear relationship between governance and pro-poor growth, while the impact of governance on inclusive growth appears to be linear. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The relationship between income distribution inequality and inflation is widely discussed in economics. The different concepts of macroeconomic management in various countries have different implications for each country. This paper aims to examine the relationship between inequality in income distribution and inflation. Panel ARDL with semi-annual data from 33 provinces in Indonesia for the period of 2012-2018 is used in this model. The results show that changes in poverty and economic growth are not statistically significant in affecting the changes of income disparity in short run. Inflation is too low, thus it is less effective at encouraging income inequality in Indonesia. In addition, in the long run, inflation does not affect the inequality of income distribution, it is assumed that the benefits of inflation are concentrated in groups of people with high income levels. Moreover, economic growth has negative impact on income inequality and poverty that eventually will aggravate the imbalance in income distribution. Therefore, its is recommended for Indonesia's economy to be directed at increasing inflation to reach the ideal level in order to be able to reduce the imbalance in income distribution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This paper focuses on three key metrics of poverty, income distribution and employment to ascertain the pro-poor and inclusive-growth position of the western African region. The roles of governance structures and their interactive effects are also accommodated to capture the peculiarity of the region. Design/methodology/approach: The paper employs fixed and dynamic models. Findings: Evidence suggests that growth is pro-poor, although virtually all governance indicators are sterile in stimulating poverty reduction. The authors observe that health and education spending coupled with trade-openness stimulate pro-poor growth potentials, whereas conflicts culminate the pervasiveness of poverty in the region. By empirically answering the question of how inclusive is economic growth through the lens of income-distribution and employment, the authors show that growth has been exclusive as per-capita-GDP growth rather dampens income shared by the poorest 20%. Also, it is observed that growth has not been inclusive as the jobless-growth argument remains valid while high inequality further exacerbates unemployment in the region. It is further shown that governance has been generally weak in propelling inclusive growth except where the institutional-component of governance stimulates inclusive growth through improvement in equality and labor employability. Originality/value: The study jointly examines the metrics of poverty, income distribution and employment to ascertain growth pro-poorness and inclusivity which are key for the achievement of African-union (AU) agenda 2063. The study captures cross-sectional dependence among selected countries which previous studies ignored. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This paper aims to analytically show that in an over-lapping-generation (OLG) model, low earning cohorts bear unwanted risk and absorb higher economic cost than high earning cohorts do. Design/methodology/approach: This paper aims to consider the individual's risk appetite, using a simple utility function, based on consumptions and discount rates in each period. This paper calibrates the model according to teh Israeli pension system as a representative of a small open developed organization for economic cooperation and development country. Israel is considered as unique case study in the pension landscape, as it implements almost pure defined contribution pension scheme with continuous trend of pension market capitalization (Giorno and Jacques, 2016). Hence, this study finds Israel suitable for examining the theoretical mix of pension scheme. That model enables exploring combined solutions for adequate old age benefits, involving the first and the second pension pillars, under fiscal constraints. Findings: It comes out that for risk-averse individuals, the optimal degree of funding is negatively correlated to asset returns' volatility and positively correlated to earning decile level. The neglect of risk and individual's current earning level will thus overstate the contribution level and funded percentage from total contributions. Moreover, even in an economy with minimum government intervention, and highly developed private pension fund with high average of rate of return, the authors find it is optimal that the pension system contains a sizeable unfunded pillar. This paper innovates by revealing a socio-economic anomaly in design of mix pension systems in favor of high earning cohorts on the expense of economic loss of low earning cohorts. Practical implications: The model presented in this paper could be implemented in countries with mix pension systems, as an alternative to public social transfers or means tested, alleviating poverty and inequality in old age. Additionally, this model could raise the public awareness of the financial sustainability of the unfunded pay-as-you-go pillar to diversify financial risk in pension systems, especially for low earning cohort in society. Social implications: One area of research that is particularly relevant in this context concerns the issue of alleviating poverty and income inequality. It is often stressed that the prevention of old age poverty is among the central targets of well-designed pension system (Holzmann and Hinz, 2005). The conceptualization of minimum pension guarantee used in this composition allows to clearly capturing the notion of such a poverty and social targets as an integral part of the pension system rolls. Originality/value: This paper innovates by revealing a socio-economic anomaly in design of mix pension systems in favor of high earning cohorts on the expense of economic loss of low earning cohorts. That comes to realize through the level of total contribution rates and funded share that are generally optimal for high earning cohorts but not for low earning cohorts. This paper identifies that the effect of anomaly is most significant in a market characterized with high income-inequality level. This paper finds that imposing intra-generational risk sharing instrument in the form of minimum pension guarantee can re-balance pension design among different earning cohorts. This solution demonstrates balancing effect on the entire economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The shock of the COVID-19 pandemic affected the human capital formation of children and youths. As a consequence of this disruption, the pandemic is likely to imply permanent lower levels of human capital. This paper provides new evidence on the impact of COVID-19 and school closures on education in Latin America by exploiting harmonized microdata from a large set of national household surveys carried out in 2020, during the pandemic. In addition, the paper uses microsimulations to assess the potential effect of changes in human capital due to the COVID-19 crisis on future income distributions. The findings show that the pandemic is likely to have significant long-run consequences in terms of incomes and poverty if strong compensatory measures are not taken soon. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the trade–peace nexus in Africa and ascertains how poverty and inequality tilt the relationship in the eight regional (economic) blocs in Africa, viz. the Arab Maghreb Union (UMA), the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA), the Community of Sahel–Saharan States (CEN–SAD), the East African Community (EAC), the Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS), the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) and the Southern African Development Community (SADC), from 1998 to 2020 using the Driscoll–Kraay estimate. The study contributes to the literature by disaggregating the peace effect of trade in Africa by the regional (economic) blocs to allow for in‐depth and context‐specific analysis. The paper also expands the scope of existing studies by examining the direct effect of poverty and inequality on peace in addition to the indirect effect that is revealed through their interactions with trade integrations. The findings reveal that trade promotes peace in Africa, while wide income inequality and a large poverty gap increase the likelihood of conflict. The interaction of poverty and inequality with trade integration shows that while the poverty level does not improve the effect of trade on peace, inequality reduces the impact of trade on peace. The study concludes that poverty and inequality play significant roles in the trade–peace nexus in Africa. Policy recommendations are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Poverty is one of the world's greatest economic and social problems of all time. Therefore, sustainable solutions to reduce it are essential to increase the well-being of individuals and society. In this paper, the various causes of poverty, such as social and economic inequalities, limited access to education and health, will be analysed. After an introduction, the concept of sustainable development will be presented, underlying the virtues, as well as limits of it. There will be explored sustainable solutions for poverty reduction, which focus on sustainable development and the promotion of social and economic inclusion. Such solutions could be the creation of jobs and investment in the agricultural sector, the development of infrastructure and public services, the promotion of access to education and health services, and support for local communities and the social and solidarity economy. To validate these findings, qualitative methodology based on content analysis of sustainable development literature will allow to identify and evaluate good practices in sustainable development and poverty reduction. Therefore, it will be possible to show that sustainable solutions for poverty reduction are not only feasible but also effective in terms of social and economic impact. The paper will end with conclusions, arguing that sustainable solutions to poverty reduction are the key to increasing the well-being of individuals and society, and showing that interconnectivity, when considered in a sustainable approach, can improve the benefits for economic and social life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper studies the effects of mining intensity and presence on Peru's mining districts' welfare from 2004 to 2019. A pooled cross-section regression is used which is constructed from different sources and two sets of comparisons are made: the first compare districts with and without mining presence within mining provinces, and the second compares districts with and without mining presence without the constraint of being within mining provinces. The primary dependent variables included in the model are income inequality, labor income, and poverty rate. In mining districts, inequality has increased, but labor income has increased, and poverty has decreased compared to non-mining districts. However, once control for province-fixed effects and clustered by standard errors at the district level, the significance of inequality is lost, while the impacts on labor income and poverty remain. The transmission mechanisms are human capital, employment, and redistributive policies. Also the mining presence has had positive effects on labor income in other sectors such as construction and commerce; Finally, the labor incomes of unskilled workers increases but not the labor incomes of skilled workers, and it has negatively impacted informal employment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Poverty reduction is considered as the top priority of governments and international institutions. At the same time income inequality is a far-reaching concern especially in emerging nations. US former president even labelled income inequality and poverty are the challenges of our times. Theoretically there are different views on the impact of microfinancing and financial inclusion on income inequality and poverty, hence, it is interesting to evaluate these estimations in Vietnamese context from 1986 to 2020. The researchers have applied the Bayesian Auto-regressive Distributed Lags (BARDL) model and exposed that microfinancing, financial inclusion, educational loans increase income equality and reduces poverty. Based on the evidences, the paper implies that government institutions must focus on microfinancing and financial inclusion aspects to facilitate poor and boost prosperity which ultimately brings income equality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Those who have been forced to resettle by water conservancy projects (WCP) have always been a group that is characterised by high poverty and livelihood vulnerability, mainly due to insufficient compensation and the fragmentation of their social networks. In 2020, the Chinese government announced that China had achieved comprehensive poverty alleviation, implying that all WCP-induced resettlers, have been lifted out of poverty. However, China's current poverty line is based on the minimum subsistence standard, namely the absolute poverty line, which fails to objectively reflect China's uneven development and individuals' actual consumption needs. Therefore, in order to comprehensively analyse the poverty status of WCP-induced resettlers in contemporary China, this paper reassessed the poverty status of contemporary WCP-induced resettlers from the perspective of development-based poverty and consumption-based poverty. Based on survey data from over 1000 households who were forced to resettle due to China's 'Yangtze River to Huai River Inter-basin Water Diversion' project, this paper concludes that: (1) China's current absolute poverty line is outdated for contemporary WCP-induced resettlers, due to the fact they had basically been lifted out of absolute poverty by 2018, and those who remain poor need to be addressed through the bottom line guarantee of local governments; (2) the role of land as a form of basic insurance can alleviate income inequality and mitigate the risk of force majeure. Therefore, those resettled from rural areas have stronger income stability and greater resilience to risks; (3) the poverty status of contemporary WCP-induced resettlers is mainly consumption-based, and it is worse for resettlers from urban areas. Based on these conclusions, we suggest that the government should try to avoid large-scale relocation of WCP-induced resettlers to urban areas, and try to provide more insurances to them, such as providing arable land and sharing the benefits of water conservancy projects with the resettlers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How do trade reforms impact households in different parts of the income distribution? This paper presents a new database, the Household Impacts of Tariffs data set, which contains harmonized household survey and tariff data for 54 low- and middle-income countries. The data cover highly disaggregated information on household budget and income shares for 53 agricultural products, wage labor income, non-farm enterprise sales and transfers, as well as spending on manufacturing and services. Using a stylized model of the first-order impacts of import tariffs on household real income, this paper quantifies the welfare implications of agricultural trade protection. On average, unilateral elimination of agricultural tariffs would increase household incomes by 2.50 percentage points. Import tariffs have highly heterogeneous effects across countries and within countries across households, consumers, and income earners; the average standard deviation of the gains from trade within a country is 1.01 percentage points. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the effects of eliminating Gender Pay Gap on income and poverty. Drawing upon the European Statistics on Income and Living Conditions for Portugal, we use econometric tools to estimate the counterfactual earnings. The results obtained over the period under study (2014, 2017 and 2019) show that the average hourly income of women would increase by around 38%; the average annual income of households with women in the labor market would be around 22% higher; the poverty indicators would fall by 5% points; single female households and Madeira region would show a more significant decline in poverty. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we analyze the influence of the perceived level of economic inequality in daily life on people's recognition of the perceived humanity gap between low- and high-socioeconomic groups within society. To achieve this purpose, in Studies 1A–B, we analyzed the relationship between economic inequality and the humanity gap. In Studies 2A–B, we manipulated the level of inequality (low vs. high) to identify differences in the humanity gap. Results indicated that higher perceptions of economic inequality lead individuals to recognize a wider humanity gap between low- and high-socioeconomic groups in society. Implications are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Countries around the world are working to develop social protection floors to help reduce poverty. Ensuring workers can earn adequate wages is an important component of social protection floors. In this paper, we explore who receives minimum, poverty, median, and living wages in Jordan, comparing 2010 and 2016, and in Tunisia in 2014. We demonstrate that while the majority of workers do earn at least minimum and poverty wages, only a minority of workers earn a living wage. The chances of earning minimum, poverty, median, and living wages depend on the characteristics of workplaces, specific work characteristics (especially job formality and skills required), and the demographic characteristics of workers. While results are consistent with wages reflecting, in part, workers' productivity, they may also reflect rents, efficiency wages, and for minimum wages issues with enforceability and policy design. These findings highlight which workers are vulnerable to low earnings and where greater enforcement or redesign of minimum wage legislation might be needed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The increasing wave of protectionism in various corners of the world with the use of seemingly attractive but economically misleading slogans (shortening supply chains, onshoring, reshoring, nearshoring, friend-shoring, reindustrialization, and ending/correcting 'hyperglobalization', etc.) creates a serious challenge to the global trading system and global economic development. Trade and financial transactions have also become victims of the increasing number of geopolitical conflicts and tensions, both 'hot' and 'cold'. Before it becomes too late, i.e., before the current trade tensions go too far and create the hardly reversible spiral of trade and financial wars, retaliations, etc., it is desirable to reflect on what can be lost due to protectionism. This essay analyzes four areas that have benefited from global economic integration since the 1980s (economic growth, poverty eradication, reduction in global economic inequalities, and disinflation) and may suffer from its reversal. It also discusses potential remedies that may help stop a protectionist drift. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The inability of macroeconomists to anticipate the Global Financial Crisis or reproduce it in their models has led to an important stock-taking of deficiencies in, and necessary modifications to, theories and models used pervasively by researchers and taught to graduate students. This stock-taking—the so-called "Rebuilding Macroeconomic Theory Project," organized by David Vines and Samuel Wills—has provided an opportunity for economy-wide modelers (who include regional scientists) to consider whether the theories and models they employ are adequate and appropriate to the tasks to which they put them. In this paper I provide a brief report on the project, retrace the development of macroeconomics, and summarize responses by prominent macroeconomists to a set of questions posed by organizers of the project, while drawing implications of these questions and responses for regional science. I then offer original suggestions from a regional scientist's perspective on what is missing from the "benchmark" macro-model, how financial frictions can be introduced, how behavioral foundations might be modified, how heterogeneity of agents might be captured, and what new stylized facts need to be explained. I proceed to illustrate how several of the suggested changes can be integrated in economy-wide models by drawing on a study of the impacts of monetary policy on consumption by different income groups in Indonesia. I close the paper by posing a number of "big-picture questions" on the implications of the RMTP for economy-wide modelers and regional scientists to ponder and by offering a brief reflection and aspiration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper approximates the identity that links growth in mean incomes and changes in the distribution of relative incomes to reductions in absolute poverty and examines the role of income inequality for poverty reduction. Under the assumption that income is log-normally distributed, we show that we can approximate this identity well. We find that the inequality elasticity of poverty reduction is larger, on average, compared to the growth elasticity of poverty reduction and that the growth elasticity declines steeply with a country's initial level of inequality. However, we find that prior changes in poverty were, in large part, explained by changes in mean incomes. This is a consequence of changes in income inequality being an order of magnitude smaller than changes in mean incomes. Overall, our results highlight the important role income inequality can play in reducing poverty despite prior poverty changes being, in large part, a consequence of economic growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research background: Income inequality and poverty attract a lot of attention among politicians, activists as well as scientists, who are trying to find a solution to these socio-economic problems. State intervention is commonly expected in this field, however, there is no agreement about the most efficient methods and instruments, as well as about the scale of public expenditure for the purpose of limiting poverty and inequality. Purpose of the article: The aim of the paper is to specify efficiency of government social spending in reducing problems of poverty and income inequality in the EU countries. Moreover, the attention is paid to changes in the efficiency in a period of the 2007 crisis occurrence and its overcoming and to sources of the changes. Methods: To fulfill the main goal of the paper, the DEA method is used, which enables to compare the social efficiency of the EU countries. The Malmquist index is also calculated and decomposed to identify changes in the efficiency and their sources in the crisis period. Data used in the analyses were obtained from Eurostat and OECD databases and cover the period from 2007 to 2016 year. Findings & Value added: The main findings of the paper shed some light on the differences in social efficiency of government spending in the EU countries. Generally, the countries with a higher level of social spending are also those with lower efficiency in inequality reduction, however, the relationship doesn't appear for poverty alleviation. Thus, the research suggests some substitution between the scale and the efficiency of social spending, at least for the inequality dimension. Moreover, some differences in a social model can be found between the countries of the South and of the North: the countries of the South focus their social policy mainly on inequality reduction, while the Scandinavian countries as well as some other affluent societies direct their public support mainly on poverty alleviation. The research also shows that in the crisis period decreases in efficiency concerned mainly the poverty dimension. It reflects the fact that the poor were the losers of the crisis in favor of the middle classes. The efficiency losses were induced by negative changes in the current usage of public sources, while institutional reforms positively influenced the efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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The primary goal of Liberation Theology is to change the material conditions of marginalised and oppressed groups in society. Within Islamic Liberation Theology, however, issues related to class and economic inequality are notably missing. This paper seeks to begin this conversation and highlight the necessity of addressing economic exploitation, which affects most of the world's population and Muslims disproportionately. Using a praxis-based methodology, it centres the interpretation of activists from Nijjor Manush, a British Bengali activist group, and seeks to understand how Islam is used as a liberative tool to combat class oppression. Through interviews and focus groups, an alternative and revolutionary Islam emerges. Echoing a Marxist understanding of class, it sees exploitation as an inherent part of the current capitalist system and recognises the necessity of people seizing economic power. This overarching objective is the lens through which activism in the here and now is interpreted and tactics decided. Establishing economic justice therefore means trying to secure "non-reformist reforms" in the short term, which resist the logic of capital and secure the interests of the marginalised, while working towards the ultimate goal of ending economic exploitation and, by extension, abolishing class. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]