Advanced Search
MyIDEAS: Login

Democracy and income inequality : an empirical analysis

Contents:

Author Info

  • Gradstein, Mark
  • Milanovic, Branko
  • Ying, Yvonne

Abstract

Standard political economy theories suggest that democratization has a moderating effect on income inequality. But the empirical literature has failed to uncover any such robust relationship. The authors take another look at the issue. The authors argue that prevailing ideology may be an important determinant of inequality and that the democratization effect"works through"ideology. In societies that value equality highly there is less distributional conflict among income groups, so democratization may have only a negligible effect on inequality. But in societies that value equality less, democratization reduces inequality through redistribution as the poor outvote the rich. The authors'cross-country empirical analysis, covering 126 countries in 1960-98, confirms the hypothesis: ideology, as proxied by a country's dominant religion, seems to be related to inequality. In addition, while in Judeo-Christian societies increased democratization appears to lead to lower inequality, in Muslim and Confucian societies it has an insignificant effect. The authors hypothesize that Muslim and Confucian societies rely on informal transfers to reach the desired level of inequality, while Judeo-Christian societies, where family ties are weaker, use political action.

Download Info

If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the proper application to view it first. In case of further problems read the IDEAS help page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
File URL: http://www-wds.worldbank.org/servlet/WDSContentServer/WDSP/IB/2001/04/07/000094946_01032905305396/Rendered/PDF/multi0page.pdf
Download Restriction: no

Bibliographic Info

Paper provided by The World Bank in its series Policy Research Working Paper Series with number 2561.

as in new window
Length:
Date of creation: 31 Mar 2001
Date of revision:
Handle: RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:2561

Contact details of provider:
Postal: 1818 H Street, N.W., Washington, DC 20433
Phone: (202) 477-1234
Email:
Web page: http://www.worldbank.org/
More information through EDIRC

Related research

Keywords: Governance Indicators; Inequality; Poverty Impact Evaluation; Human Rights; National Governance;

Other versions of this item:

References

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.:
as in new window
  1. Gary S. Becker, 1974. "A Theory of Social Interactions," NBER Working Papers 0042, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  2. Torsten Persson & Guido Tabellini, 1999. "Political Economics and Public Finance," NBER Working Papers 7097, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  3. Michael Rothschild & Joseph E. Stiglitz, 1972. "Some Further Results on the Measurement of Inequality," Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers 344, Cowles Foundation for Research in Economics, Yale University.
  4. Rodrik, Dani, 1998. "Democracies Pay Higher Wages," CEPR Discussion Papers 1776, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
  5. Hillman, Arye L. & Ursprung, Heinrich W., 2000. "Political culture and economic decline," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 16(2), pages 189-213, June.
  6. Hongyi Li & Lyn Squire & Tao Zhang & Heng-fu Zou, 1999. "A Data Set on Income Distribution," CEMA Working Papers 575, China Economics and Management Academy, Central University of Finance and Economics.
  7. Flemming, J.S. & Micklewright, John, 2000. "Income distribution, economic systems and transition," Handbook of Income Distribution, in: A.B. Atkinson & F. Bourguignon (ed.), Handbook of Income Distribution, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 14, pages 843-918 Elsevier.
  8. repec:fth:oxesaf:98-8 is not listed on IDEAS
  9. Deininger, Klaus & Squire, Lyn, 1998. "New ways of looking at old issues: inequality and growth," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 57(2), pages 259-287.
  10. Bisin, A. & Verdier, T., 1999. "A model of cultural transmission, voting and political ideology," DELTA Working Papers 1999-13, DELTA (Ecole normale supérieure).
  11. Atkinson,Anthony Barnes & Micklewright,John, 1992. "Economic Transformation in Eastern Europe and the Distribution of Income," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521433297.
  12. Perotti, Roberto, 1996. " Growth, Income Distribution, and Democracy: What the Data Say," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 1(2), pages 149-87, June.
  13. Klaus Deininger & Lyn Squire, 1996. "A New Data Set Measuring Income Inequality," CEMA Working Papers 512, China Economics and Management Academy, Central University of Finance and Economics.
  14. Meltzer, Allan H & Richard, Scott F, 1981. "A Rational Theory of the Size of Government," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 89(5), pages 914-27, October.
  15. Hongyi Li & Lyn Squire & Heng-fu Zou, 1998. "Explaining International and Intertemporal Variations in Income Inequality," CEMA Working Papers 73, China Economics and Management Academy, Central University of Finance and Economics.
  16. Milanovic, Branko, 2000. "The median-voter hypothesis, income inequality, and income redistribution: an empirical test with the required data," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 16(3), pages 367-410, September.
  17. Beck, Thorsten & Clarke, George & Groff, Alberto & Keefer, Philip & Walsh, Patrick, 2000. "New tools and new tests in comparative political economy - the database of political institutions," Policy Research Working Paper Series 2283, The World Bank.
  18. Easterly, William, 2000. "the middle class consensus and economic development," Policy Research Working Paper Series 2346, The World Bank.
  19. Gradstein, Mark & Justman, Moshe, 2000. "Human capital, social capital, and public schooling," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 44(4-6), pages 879-890, May.
  20. Hochman, Harold M & Rodgers, James D, 1969. "Pareto Optimal Redistribution," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 59(4), pages 542-57, Part I Se.
  21. Milanovic, Branko & DEC, 1994. "Determinants of cross-country income inequality : an augmented Kuznets hypothesis," Policy Research Working Paper Series 1246, The World Bank.
  22. Milanovic, Branko, 1998. "Explaining the increase in inequality during the transition," Policy Research Working Paper Series 1935, The World Bank.
  23. Ahluwalia, Montek S., 1976. "Inequality, poverty and development," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 3(4), pages 307-342, December.
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 in new window

Cited by:
  1. Hisako KAI & Shigeyuki HAMORI, 2009. "Globalization, Financial Depth, and Inequality in Sub-Saharan Africa," Discussion Papers 0912, Graduate School of Economics, Kobe University.
  2. Carlyn Dobson & Antonio Rodríguez, 2010. "Is Corruption Really Bad for Inequality? Evidence from Latin America," Development Research Working Paper Series 02/2010, Institute for Advanced Development Studies.
  3. Branko Milanovic, 2003. "Can We Discern The Effect Of Globalization On Income Distribution? Evidence From Household Surveys," HEW 0310002, EconWPA.
  4. Rasha Hashim Osman & Constantinos Alexiou & Persefoni Tsaliki, 2012. "The role of institutions in economic development: Evidence from 27 Sub-Saharan African countries," International Journal of Social Economics, Emerald Group Publishing, vol. 39(2), pages 142-160, January.
  5. Kinda, Somlanare Romuald, 2011. "Democratic Institutions and Environmental Quality: Effects and Transmission Channels," Proceedings of the German Development Economics Conference, Berlin 2011 46, Verein für Socialpolitik, Research Committee Development Economics.
  6. Milanovic, Branko & Hoff, Karla & Horowitz, Shale, 2008. "Political Alternation as a Restraint on Investing in Influence: Evidence from the Post-Communist Transition," MPRA Paper 11829, University Library of Munich, Germany.
  7. César Calderón & Alberto Chong & Rodrigo Valdés, 2004. "Labor Market Regulations and Income Inequality: Evidence for a Panel of Countries," Research Department Publications 4375, Inter-American Development Bank, Research Department.
  8. Fabrizio Carmignani, 2007. "Efficiency of Institutions, Political Stability and Income Dynamics," The IUP Journal of Managerial Economics, IUP Publications, vol. 0(1), pages 6-30, February.
  9. Uwaifo Oyelere, Ruth, 2007. "Within and Between Gender Disparities in Income and Education Benefits from Democracy," IZA Discussion Papers 3221, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA).
  10. Muhammad, Shahbaz & Reza, Sherafatian-Jahromi & Muhammad, Nasir Malik, 2012. "Linkages between Defence Spending and Income Inequality in Iran," MPRA Paper 41983, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 14 Oct 2012.
  11. Lin, Eric S. & Ali, Hamid E., 2009. "Military Spending and Inequality: Panel Granger Causality Test," MPRA Paper 40159, University Library of Munich, Germany.
  12. Shen, Yan & Yao, Yang, 2008. "Does grassroots democracy reduce income inequality in China?," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 92(10-11), pages 2182-2198, October.
  13. Anneli Kaasa, 2005. "Factors Of Income Inequality And Their Influence Mechanisms: A Theoretical Overview," University of Tartu - Faculty of Economics and Business Administration Working Paper Series 40, Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, University of Tartu (Estonia).

Lists

This item is not listed on Wikipedia, on a reading list or among the top items on IDEAS.

Statistics

Access and download statistics

Corrections

When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:2561

For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (Roula I. Yazigi).

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 references are entirely missing, you can add them using this form.

If the full references list an item that is present in RePEc, but the system did not link 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 profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

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