IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/chb/bcchec/v22y2019i3p154-203.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The wealth distribution in developed and developing economies: comparing the United States to Chile using survey data from 2007

Author

Listed:
  • Sofía Bauducco
  • Gonzalo Castex
  • Andrew Davis

Abstract

This study examines the distributions of income, assets, debt, and wealth within Chile, using data from the 2007 Household Financial Survey. We detail inequality at the aggregate level and also by a variety of subgroups, including age, gender, household type, employment type, and educational attainment. In comparison with data from the US Survey of Consumer Finances, we find that income and debt are more unequally distributed in Chile than in the US, but assets and wealth are more equally distributed in Chile than in the US. Our results suggest that, among common theories that seek to explain wealth inequality in the US, high payoffs to and the incentives imposed by entrepreneurship are the most plausible.

Suggested Citation

  • Sofía Bauducco & Gonzalo Castex & Andrew Davis, 2019. "The wealth distribution in developed and developing economies: comparing the United States to Chile using survey data from 2007," Journal Economía Chilena (The Chilean Economy), Central Bank of Chile, vol. 22(3), pages 154-203, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:chb:bcchec:v:22:y:2019:i:3:p:154-203
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://si2.bcentral.cl/public/pdf/revista-economia/2019/dic/BCCh-rec-v22n3dic2019p154-203.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Jorratt De Luis, Michel & Fairfield, Tasha, 2015. "Top Income Shares, Business Profits, and Effective Tax Rates in Contemporary Chile," Working Papers 13744, Institute of Development Studies, International Centre for Tax and Development.
    2. DiNardo, John & Fortin, Nicole M & Lemieux, Thomas, 1996. "Labor Market Institutions and the Distribution of Wages, 1973-1992: A Semiparametric Approach," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 64(5), pages 1001-1044, September.
    3. Claudia Sanhueza & Ricardo Mayer, 2011. "Top Incomes in Chile using 50 years of household surveys : 1957-2007," Estudios de Economia, University of Chile, Department of Economics, vol. 38(1 Year 20), pages 169-193, June.
    4. Nezih Guner & Remzi Kaygusuz & Gustavo Ventura, 2014. "Income Taxation of U.S. Households: Facts and Parametric Estimates," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 17(4), pages 559-581, October.
    5. Saez, Emmanuel & Zucman, Gabriel, 2014. "Wealth Inequality in the United States since 1913: Evidence from Capitalized Income Tax Data," CEPR Discussion Papers 10227, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    6. Carlos Madeira, 2019. "Computing population weights for the EFH survey," Journal Economía Chilena (The Chilean Economy), Central Bank of Chile, vol. 22(1), pages 004-026, April.
    7. Huggett, Mark, 1996. "Wealth distribution in life-cycle economies," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 38(3), pages 469-494, December.
    8. Jonathan Heathcote & Fabrizio Perri & Giovanni L. Violante, 2010. "Unequal We Stand: An Empirical Analysis of Economic Inequality in the United States: 1967-2006," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 13(1), pages 15-51, January.
    9. Olympia Bover, 2010. "Wealth Inequality And Household Structure: U.S. Vs. Spain," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 56(2), pages 259-290, June.
    10. Carlos Madeira, 2015. "Identification of Earning Dynamics using Rotating Samples over Short Periods: The Case of Chile," Working Papers Central Bank of Chile 754, Central Bank of Chile.
    11. Nezih Guner & Remzi Kaygusuz & Gustavo Ventura, 2014. "Income Taxation of U.S. Households: Facts and Parametric Estimates," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 17(4), pages 559-581, October.
    12. Cordoba, Juan-Carlos, 2008. "U.S. inequality: Debt constraints or incomplete asset markets?," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(2), pages 350-364, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Sofía Bauducco & Gonzalo Castex, 2013. "The Wealth Distribution in Developing Economies: Comparing the United States to Chile," Working Papers Central Bank of Chile 702, Central Bank of Chile.
    2. Nawid Siassi, 2019. "Inequality and the Marriage Gap," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 31, pages 160-181, January.
    3. Kaymak, Barıș & Leung, David & Poschke, Markus, 2020. "Accounting for Wealth Concentration in the US," IZA Discussion Papers 13082, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    4. Musab Kurnaz & Mehmet Soytas, 2019. "Early Childhood Investment and Income Taxation," 2019 Meeting Papers 290, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    5. Minchul Yum, 2023. "Parental Time Investment And Intergenerational Mobility," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 64(1), pages 187-223, February.
    6. Bredemeier, Christian & Gravert, Jan & Juessen, Falko, 2021. "Accounting for Limited Commitment between Spouses When Estimating Labor-Supply Elasticities," IZA Discussion Papers 14226, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    7. Nezih Guner & Martin Lopez-Daneri & Gustavo Ventura, 2023. "The Looming Fiscal Reckoning: Tax Distortions, Top Earners, and Revenues," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 50, pages 146-170, October.
    8. Brant Abbott & Giovanni Gallipoli, 2022. "Permanent‐income inequality," Quantitative Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 13(3), pages 1023-1060, July.
    9. Adam M Guren & Alisdair McKay & Emi Nakamura & Jón Steinsson, 2021. "Housing Wealth Effects: The Long View," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 88(2), pages 669-707.
    10. Alejandro Badel & Mark Huggett & Wenlan Luo, 2020. "Taxing Top Earners: a Human Capital Perspective," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 130(629), pages 1200-1225.
    11. Job Boerma & Loukas Karabarbounis, 2021. "Inferring Inequality With Home Production," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 89(5), pages 2517-2556, September.
    12. Ferrreira, Ana Melissa, 2019. "Skill-Biased Technological Change and Inequality in the U.S," MPRA Paper 93914, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    13. Kurnaz, Musab & Soytas, Mehmet A., 2019. "Intergenerational Income Mobility and Income Taxation," GLO Discussion Paper Series 409, Global Labor Organization (GLO).
    14. Graciela Sanroman & Guillermo Santos, 2021. "The joint distribution of income and wealth in Uruguay," Revista Cuadernos de Economia, Universidad Nacional de Colombia, FCE, CID, vol. 40(83), pages 609-642, August.
    15. Been-Lo Chen & Fei-Chi Liang, 2024. "Optimal Taxation in the Life Cycle with Human Capital Investment," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 52, pages 21-45, April.
    16. Nezih Guner & Gustavo Ventura & Remzi Kaygusuz, 2019. "Rethinking the Welfare State," 2019 Meeting Papers 494, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    17. Youngsoo Jang & Minchul Yum, 2020. "Aggregate and Intergenerational Implications of School Closures: A Quantitative Assessment," CRC TR 224 Discussion Paper Series crctr224_2020_234v2, University of Bonn and University of Mannheim, Germany.
    18. Maren Froemel & Charles Gottlieb, 2021. "The Earned Income Tax Credit: Targeting the poor but crowding out wealth," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 54(1), pages 193-227, February.
    19. António R. Antunes & Valerio Ercolani, 2020. "Intergenerational wealth inequality: the role of demographics," Working Papers w202009, Banco de Portugal, Economics and Research Department.
    20. Alessandro Di Nola & Georgi Kocharkov & Almuth Scholl & Anna-Mariia Tkhir, 2021. "The Aggregate Consequences of Tax Evasion," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 40, pages 198-227, April.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:chb:bcchec:v:22:y:2019:i:3:p:154-203. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Fredherick Sanllehi (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/bccgvcl.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.