This paper combines two strands of the literature on inequality and distribution issues: the classical approach, which insists on the division of society into classes characterized by different saving propensities, and the social conflict approach, which considers that inequality inflicts direct and indirect costs to economic development. An endogenous-growth model is studied. We assume that each consumer's subjective discount factor is determined endogenously and depends on economic inequality through the following two channels. On the one hand, it is positively related to the individual consumer's relative wealth. On the other hand, it is negatively affected by a simple aggregate measure of social conflict. We show that, unlike models with exogenously given discount rates, steady state equilibria in our model is indeterminate and that the set of all equilibria is acontinuum which can be parameterized by a simple index of income inequality. The growth rate is ambiguously related to the inequality index. However, under some reasonable assumptions, the growth rate dependence on this index has an inverted U-shaped form.
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Paper provided by Université catholique de Louvain, Center for Operations Research and Econometrics (CORE) in its series CORE Discussion Papers with number
2007044.
Find related papers by JEL classification: D31 - Microeconomics - - Distribution - - - Personal Income and Wealth Distribution D90 - Microeconomics - - Intertemporal Choice and Growth - - - General O10 - Economic Development, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - General
References listed on IDEAS Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
Shi, Shouyong & Epstein, Larry G, 1993.
"Habits and Time Preference,"
International Economic Review,
Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 34(1), pages 61-84, February.
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