IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/pra/mprapa/40702.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Trade Openness, Conflict Risk and Income Inequality

Author

Listed:
  • Oloufade, Djoulassi K.

Abstract

This paper investigates the effect of trade openness on income inequality, and shows how this effect is shaped by the presence of conflicts. I argue that income-generating activities controlled by the rich expand during conflicts, whereas those controlled by the poor contract. I find that trade openness leads to greater income inequality in countries where the risk of conflicts is high. Moreover, income inequality is directly affected by conflicts, and is higher in more ethnically diverse countries and lower under democratic regimes. The econometric analysis suggests that these effects are robust to a wide range of economic and institutional factors.

Suggested Citation

  • Oloufade, Djoulassi K., 2012. "Trade Openness, Conflict Risk and Income Inequality," MPRA Paper 40702, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised Feb 2013.
    • Handle: RePEc:pra:mprapa:40702
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/40702/1/MPRA_paper_40702.pdf
    File Function: original version
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. José G. Montalvo & Marta Reynal-Querol, 2005. "Ethnic Polarization, Potential Conflict, and Civil Wars," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(3), pages 796-816, June.
    2. Robert C. Feenstra & Gordon H. Hanson, 1999. "The Impact of Outsourcing and High-Technology Capital on Wages: Estimates For the United States, 1979–1990," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 114(3), pages 907-940.
    3. Daron Acemoglu & Davide Ticchi & Andrea Vindigni, 2010. "A Theory of Military Dictatorships," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 2(1), pages 1-42, January.
    4. Angus Deaton & Christina Paxson, 1997. "The effects of economic and population growth on national saving and inequality," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 34(1), pages 97-114, February.
    5. William Easterly & Ross Levine, 1997. "Africa's Growth Tragedy: Policies and Ethnic Divisions," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 112(4), pages 1203-1250.
    6. Michaud, Pierre-Carl & van Soest, Arthur, 2008. "Health and wealth of elderly couples: Causality tests using dynamic panel data models," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 27(5), pages 1312-1325, September.
    7. Branko Milanovic & Lyn Squire, 2007. "Does Tariff Liberalization Increase Wage Inequality? Some Empirical Evidence," NBER Chapters, in: Globalization and Poverty, pages 143-182, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    8. Joan Esteban & Debraj Ray, 2011. "Linking Conflict to Inequality and Polarization," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(4), pages 1345-1374, June.
    9. Bun, Maurice J. G. & Kiviet, Jan F., 2003. "On the diminishing returns of higher-order terms in asymptotic expansions of bias," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 79(2), pages 145-152, May.
    10. Deininger, Klaus & Squire, Lyn, 1996. "A New Data Set Measuring Income Inequality," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 10(3), pages 565-591, September.
    11. Bourguignon, F. & Morrisson, C., 1990. "Income distribution, development and foreign trade : A cross-sectional analysis," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 34(6), pages 1113-1132, September.
    12. Antonio Spilimbergo, 2009. "Democracy and Foreign Education," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(1), pages 528-543, March.
    13. Mattias Lundberg & Lyn Squire, 2003. "The simultaneous evolution of growth and inequality," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 113(487), pages 326-344, April.
    14. McKay, Andrew & Loveridge, Scott, 2005. "Exploring The Paradox Of Rwandan Agricultural Household Income And Nutritional Outcomes In 1990 And 2000," Staff Paper Series 11582, Michigan State University, Department of Agricultural, Food, and Resource Economics.
    15. Barro, Robert J & Lee, Jong-Wha, 2001. "International Data on Educational Attainment: Updates and Implications," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 53(3), pages 541-563, July.
    16. Çağatay Bircan & Tilman Brück & Marc Vothknecht, 2017. "Violent conflict and inequality," Oxford Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 45(2), pages 125-144, April.
    17. David Roodman, 2009. "A Note on the Theme of Too Many Instruments," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 71(1), pages 135-158, February.
    18. Spilimbergo, Antonio & Londono, Juan Luis & Szekely, Miguel, 1999. "Income distribution, factor endowments, and trade openness," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 59(1), pages 77-101, June.
    19. Julien Gourdon & Nicolas Maystre & Jaime de Melo, 2015. "Openness, Inequality and Poverty: Endowments Matter," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Developing Countries in the World Economy, chapter 20, pages 497-532, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    20. Kiviet, Jan F., 1995. "On bias, inconsistency, and efficiency of various estimators in dynamic panel data models," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 68(1), pages 53-78, July.
    21. Raghuram G. Rajan & Arvind Subramanian, 2008. "Aid and Growth: What Does the Cross-Country Evidence Really Show?," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 90(4), pages 643-665, November.
    22. Li, Hongyi & Squire, Lyn & Zou, Heng-fu, 1998. "Explaining International and Intertemporal Variations in Income Inequality," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 108(446), pages 26-43, January.
    23. Costas Meghir & Luigi Pistaferri, 2004. "Income Variance Dynamics and Heterogeneity," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 72(1), pages 1-32, January.
    24. Gupta, Sanjeev & Pattillo, Catherine A. & Wagh, Smita, 2009. "Effect of Remittances on Poverty and Financial Development in Sub-Saharan Africa," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 37(1), pages 104-115, January.
    25. Deininger, Klaus & Squire, Lyn, 1996. "A New Data Set Measuring Income Inequality," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 10(3), pages 565-591, September.
    26. Klaus Deininger, 2003. "Causes and consequences of civil strife: micro-level evidence from Uganda," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 55(4), pages 579-606, October.
    27. Paul Collier & Anke Hoeffler, 2004. "Greed and grievance in civil war," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 56(4), pages 563-595, October.
    28. Alberto Chong & Mark Gradstein, 2007. "Inequality and Institutions," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 89(3), pages 454-465, August.
    29. Alberto Alesina & Eliana La Ferrara, 2003. "Ethnic Diversity and Economic Performance," Harvard Institute of Economic Research Working Papers 2028, Harvard - Institute of Economic Research.
    30. Leamer, Edward E, 1987. "Paths of Development in the Three-Factor, n-Good General Equilibrium Model," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 95(5), pages 961-999, October.
    31. Calderon, Cesar & Chong, Alberto, 2001. "External sector and income inequality in interdependent economies using a dynamic panel data approach," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 71(2), pages 225-231, May.
    32. Simeon Djankov & Jose Montalvo & Marta Reynal-Querol, 2008. "The curse of aid," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 13(3), pages 169-194, September.
    33. Pissarides, Christopher A, 1997. "Learning by Trading and the Returns to Human Capital in Developing Countries," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 11(1), pages 17-32, January.
    34. Anderson, T. W. & Hsiao, Cheng, 1982. "Formulation and estimation of dynamic models using panel data," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 18(1), pages 47-82, January.
    35. HÃ¥vard Hegre & John R Oneal & Bruce Russett, 2010. "Trade does promote peace: New simultaneous estimates of the reciprocal effects of trade and conflict," Journal of Peace Research, Peace Research Institute Oslo, vol. 47(6), pages 763-774, November.
    36. Dollar, David & Kraay, Aart, 2002. "Growth Is Good for the Poor," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 7(3), pages 195-225, September.
    37. Fearon, James D. & Laitin, David D., 2003. "Ethnicity, Insurgency, and Civil War," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 97(1), pages 75-90, February.
    38. Asiedu, Elizabeth & Lien, Donald, 2011. "Democracy, foreign direct investment and natural resources," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 84(1), pages 99-111, May.
    39. Bruno, Giovanni S.F., 2005. "Approximating the bias of the LSDV estimator for dynamic unbalanced panel data models," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 87(3), pages 361-366, June.
    40. Ravallion, Martin, 2001. "Growth, Inequality and Poverty: Looking Beyond Averages," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 29(11), pages 1803-1815, November.
    41. James K. Galbraith & Hyunsub Kum, 2003. "Inequality and Economic Growth: A Global View Based on Measures of Pay," CESifo Economic Studies, CESifo Group, vol. 49(4), pages 527-556.
    42. Anderson, Edward, 2005. "Openness and inequality in developing countries: A review of theory and recent evidence," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 33(7), pages 1045-1063, July.
    43. Christopher Blattman & Edward Miguel, 2010. "Civil War," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 48(1), pages 3-57, March.
    44. Deininger,Klaus W., 2003. "Causes and consequences of civil strife - micro-level evidence from Uganda," Policy Research Working Paper Series 3045, The World Bank.
    45. Fajnzylber, Pablo & Lederman, Daniel & Loayza, Norman, 2002. "Inequality and Violent Crime," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 45(1), pages 1-40, April.
    46. Edwards, Sebastian, 1997. "Trade Policy, Growth, and Income Distribution," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 87(2), pages 205-210, May.
    47. Juha Auvinen & E. Wayne Nafziger, 1999. "The Sources of Humanitarian Emergencies," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 43(3), pages 267-290, June.
    48. Fischer, Ronald D., 2001. "The evolution of inequality after trade liberalization," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(2), pages 555-579, December.
    49. Barro, Robert J, 2000. "Inequality and Growth in a Panel of Countries," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 5(1), pages 5-32, March.
    50. Andrea Brandolini & Anthony B. Atkinson, 2001. "Promise and Pitfalls in the Use of "Secondary" Data-Sets: Income Inequality in OECD Countries As a Case Study," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 39(3), pages 771-799, September.
    51. Meschi, Elena & Vivarelli, Marco, 2009. "Trade and Income Inequality in Developing Countries," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 37(2), pages 287-302, February.
    52. Windmeijer, Frank, 2005. "A finite sample correction for the variance of linear efficient two-step GMM estimators," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 126(1), pages 25-51, May.
    53. José Garcia Montalvo & Marta Reynal-Querol, 2004. "Ethnic polarization, potential conflict and civil wars," Economics Working Papers 770, Department of Economics and Business, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, revised Mar 2005.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Dorcas Gonese & Asrat Tsegaye & Forget Kapingura & Sibanesizwe Alwyn Khumalo, 2022. "Trade Openness and Income Inequality: A Case of Southern African Development Community Countries," Eurasian Journal of Economics and Finance, Eurasian Publications, vol. 10(4), pages 135-151.

    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. Meschi, Elena & Vivarelli, Marco, 2009. "Trade and Income Inequality in Developing Countries," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 37(2), pages 287-302, February.
    2. Isabelle Bensidoun & Sébastien Jean & Aude Sztulman, 2011. "International trade and income distribution: reconsidering the evidence," Review of World Economics (Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv), Springer;Institut für Weltwirtschaft (Kiel Institute for the World Economy), vol. 147(4), pages 593-619, November.
    3. Gourdon, Julien, 2006. "Openness and Inequality in Developing Countries: A New Look at the Evidence," MPRA Paper 4176, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    4. Çağatay Bircan & Tilman Brück & Marc Vothknecht, 2017. "Violent conflict and inequality," Oxford Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 45(2), pages 125-144, April.
    5. Anderson, Edward, 2005. "Openness and inequality in developing countries: A review of theory and recent evidence," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 33(7), pages 1045-1063, July.
    6. Timothy Besley & Torsten Persson, 2011. "Pillars of Prosperity: The Political Economics of Development Clusters," Economics Books, Princeton University Press, edition 1, number 9624.
    7. Meschi, Elena & Vivarelli, Marco, 2007. "Globalization and Income Inequality," IZA Discussion Papers 2958, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    8. repec:dau:papers:123456789/4212 is not listed on IDEAS
    9. Julien Gourdon & Nicolas Maystre & Jaime de Melo, 2015. "Openness, Inequality and Poverty: Endowments Matter," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Developing Countries in the World Economy, chapter 20, pages 497-532, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    10. Ann-Sofie Isaksson, 2011. "Social divisions and institutions: assessing institutional parameter variation," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 147(3), pages 331-357, June.
    11. Bucevska Vesna, 2019. "Determinants of Income Inequality in EU Candidate Countries: A Panel Analysis," Economic Themes, Sciendo, vol. 57(4), pages 397-413, December.
    12. Camille Laville, 2018. "The econometrical causal analysis of internal conflicts: The evolutions of a growing literature [L’analyse économétrique des conflits internes par l’approche causale : les évolutions d’une littérat," Working Papers hal-01940461, HAL.
    13. Roberto Dell'Anno & Adalgiso Amendola, 2015. "Social Exclusion and Economic Growth: An Empirical Investigation in European Economies," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 61(2), pages 274-301, June.
    14. Dollar, David & Kraay, Aart, 2002. "Growth Is Good for the Poor," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 7(3), pages 195-225, September.
    15. Camille Laville, 2018. "The econometrical causal analysis of internal conflicts: The evolutions of a growing literature [L’analyse économétrique des conflits internes par l’approche causale : les évolutions d’une littérat," CERDI Working papers hal-01940461, HAL.
    16. Jakub Bartak & Łukasz Jabłoński, 2020. "Inequality and growth: What comes from the different inequality measures?," Bulletin of Economic Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 72(2), pages 185-212, April.
    17. Adeel Ali & Syed Faizan Iftikhar & Ambreen Fatima & Lubna Naz, 2015. "Income Inequality, Redistribution of Income and Trade Openness," The Pakistan Development Review, Pakistan Institute of Development Economics, vol. 54(4), pages 865-874.
    18. Janus, Thorsten & Riera-Crichton, Daniel, 2015. "Economic shocks, civil war and ethnicity," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 115(C), pages 32-44.
    19. Patrizio Pagano, 2004. "An empirical investigation of the relationship between inequality and growth," Temi di discussione (Economic working papers) 536, Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area.
    20. Sylvain Chabe-Ferret & Julien Gourdon & Mohamed Ali Marouani & Tancrède Voituriez, 2007. "Trade-Induced Changes in Economic Inequality: Assessment Issues and Policy Implications for Developing Countries," Working Papers DT/2007/11, DIAL (Développement, Institutions et Mondialisation).
    21. Stimpfle, Alexander & Stadelmann, David, 2015. "The Impact of Fundamental Development Factors on Different Income Groups: International Evidence," VfS Annual Conference 2015 (Muenster): Economic Development - Theory and Policy 113128, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Trade Openness; Conflict Risk; Income Inequality; Institutional Quality; Military in Politics.;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D1 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior
    • F1 - International Economics - - Trade
    • H7 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations
    • P4 - Political Economy and Comparative Economic Systems - - Other Economic Systems

    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:pra:mprapa:40702. 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: Joachim Winter (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/vfmunde.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.