Recent macroeconomic research discusses credit market imperfections as a key channel through which inequality retards growth. Limited borrowing prevents the less affluent individuals from investing the efficient amount, and the inefficiencies are considered to become stronger as inequality rises. This paper, though, argues that higher inequality may actually boost aggregate output even with convex technologies and limited borrowing. Less equality in the middle or at the top end of the distribution is associated with a lower borrowing rate and hence better access to credit for the poor. We find, however, that rising relative poverty is unambiguously bad for economic performance. Hence, we suggest that future empirical work on the inequality-growth nexus should use more specific measures of inequality rather than measures of ”overall” inequality such as the Gini index.
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Paper provided by DEGIT, Dynamics, Economic Growth, and International Trade in its series DEGIT Conference Papers with number
c011_042.
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.:
Kiminori Matsuyama, 1998.
"Endogenous Inequality,"
Discussion Papers
1238, Northwestern University, Center for Mathematical Studies in Economics and Management Science.
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