IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/wly/ijfiec/v30y2025i1p117-133.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Banks, financial markets, and income inequality

Author

Listed:
  • Yousef Makhlouf
  • Neil M. Kellard
  • Dmitri V. Vinogradov

Abstract

While financial development is often found to raise income inequality, it remains unclear whether the composition of the financial system makes a difference. In our sample of 99 countries over the period 1975–2020, increased activity of banks relative to markets in the provision of financial services is robustly associated with less inequality in the developing world yet with more inequality in developed economies. Accounting for redistribution systems does not alter this finding; banking sector concentration amplifies the effects. Results suggest that banks work at the extensive margin at earlier stages of economic development yet shift to the intensive margin at higher levels of development, where they increasingly serve the interests of the rich. Higher market power enables banks to better pursue their objectives at each of the margins.

Suggested Citation

  • Yousef Makhlouf & Neil M. Kellard & Dmitri V. Vinogradov, 2025. "Banks, financial markets, and income inequality," International Journal of Finance & Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 30(1), pages 117-133, January.
  • Handle: RePEc:wly:ijfiec:v:30:y:2025:i:1:p:117-133
    DOI: 10.1002/ijfe.2910
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1002/ijfe.2910
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1002/ijfe.2910?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Thomas Piketty & Li Yang & Gabriel Zucman, 2019. "Capital Accumulation, Private Property, and Rising Inequality in China, 1978–2015," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 109(7), pages 2469-2496, July.
    2. de la Torre, Augusto & Martínez Pería, María Soledad & Schmukler, Sergio L., 2010. "Bank involvement with SMEs: Beyond relationship lending," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 34(9), pages 2280-2293, September.
    3. Benston, George J & Smith, Clifford W, Jr, 1976. "A Transactions Cost Approach to the Theory of Financial Intermediation," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 31(2), pages 215-231, May.
    4. Agarwal, Sumit & Chomsisengphet, Souphala & Liu, Chunlin & Song, Changcheng & Souleles, Nicholas S., 2018. "Benefits of relationship banking: Evidence from consumer credit markets," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 96(C), pages 16-32.
    5. Thomas Piketty & Gabriel Zucman, 2014. "Capital is Back: Wealth-Income Ratios in Rich Countries 1700–2010," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 129(3), pages 1255-1310.
    6. Paulson, Anna L. & Townsend, Robert, 2004. "Entrepreneurship and financial constraints in Thailand," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 10(2), pages 229-262, March.
    7. Douglas W. Diamond & Philip H. Dybvig, 2000. "Bank runs, deposit insurance, and liquidity," Quarterly Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, vol. 24(Win), pages 14-23.
    8. Brei, Michael & Ferri, Giovanni & Gambacorta, Leonardo, 2023. "Financial structure and income inequality," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 131(C).
    9. Bruce D. Meyer & James X. Sullivan, 2013. "Consumption and Income Inequality and the Great Recession," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 103(3), pages 178-183, May.
    10. Gimet, Céline & Lagoarde-Segot, Thomas, 2011. "A closer look at financial development and income distribution," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 35(7), pages 1698-1713, July.
    11. Vinogradov, Dmitri, 2012. "Destructive effects of constructive ambiguity in risky times," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 31(6), pages 1459-1481.
    12. Jiménez, Gabriel & Lopez, Jose A. & Saurina, Jesús, 2013. "How does competition affect bank risk-taking?," Journal of Financial Stability, Elsevier, vol. 9(2), pages 185-195.
    13. Luintel, Kul B. & Khan, Mosahid & Leon-Gonzalez, Roberto & Li, Guangjie, 2016. "Financial development, structure and growth: New data, method and results," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 43(C), pages 95-112.
    14. Franklin Allen & Douglas Gale, 2004. "Competition and financial stability," Proceedings, Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, pages 453-486.
    15. de Haan, Jakob & Sturm, Jan-Egbert, 2017. "Finance and income inequality: A review and new evidence," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 171-195.
    16. Boot, Arnoud W. A. & Thakor, Anjan V. & Udell, Gregory F., 1991. "Credible commitments, contract enforcement problems and banks: Intermediation as credibility assurance," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 15(3), pages 605-632, June.
    17. Hasan, Iftekhar & Horvath, Roman & Mares, Jan, 2020. "Finance and wealth inequality," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 108(C).
    18. Greenwood, Jeremy & Jovanovic, Boyan, 1990. "Financial Development, Growth, and the Distribution of Income," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 98(5), pages 1076-1107, October.
    19. Moritz Kuhn & Moritz Schularick & Ulrike I. Steins, 2020. "Income and Wealth Inequality in America, 1949–2016," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 128(9), pages 3469-3519.
    20. Keeley, Michael C, 1990. "Deposit Insurance, Risk, and Market Power in Banking," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 80(5), pages 1183-1200, December.
    21. Berger, Allen N, et al, 2004. "Bank Concentration and Competition: An Evolution in the Making," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 36(3), pages 433-451, June.
    22. Allen, Franklin & Gale, Douglas, 1997. "Financial Markets, Intermediaries, and Intertemporal Smoothing," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 105(3), pages 523-546, June.
    23. Guy Michaels & Ferdinand Rauch & Stephen J. Redding, 2012. "Urbanization and Structural Transformation," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 127(2), pages 535-586.
    24. Andrea Garnero & Stephan Kampelmann & François Rycx, 2013. "Minimum Wage Systems and Earnings Inequalities: Does Institutional Diversity Matter?," Working Papers CEB 13-021, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
    25. George R. G. Clarke & Lixin Colin Xu & Heng‐fu Zou, 2006. "Finance and Income Inequality: What Do the Data Tell Us?," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 72(3), pages 578-596, January.
    26. Joseph E. Stiglitz, 1974. "Incentives and Risk Sharing in Sharecropping," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 41(2), pages 219-255.
    27. Arthur Lewbel, 2012. "Using Heteroscedasticity to Identify and Estimate Mismeasured and Endogenous Regressor Models," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 30(1), pages 67-80.
    28. Yousef Makhlouf & Neil M. Kellard & Dmitri V. Vinogradov, 2020. "Finance‐Inequality Nexus: The Long And The Short Of It," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 58(4), pages 1977-1994, October.
    29. Gary S. Becker & Nigel Tomes, 1994. "Human Capital and the Rise and Fall of Families," NBER Chapters, in: Human Capital: A Theoretical and Empirical Analysis with Special Reference to Education, Third Edition, pages 257-298, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    30. Antzoulatos, Angelos A. & Koufopoulos, Kostas & Lambrinoudakis, Costas & Tsiritakis, Emmanuel, 2016. "Supply of capital and capital structure: The role of financial development," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 38(C), pages 166-195.
    31. Degryse, Hans & Van Cayseele, Patrick, 2000. "Relationship Lending within a Bank-Based System: Evidence from European Small Business Data," Journal of Financial Intermediation, Elsevier, vol. 9(1), pages 90-109, January.
    32. Ľuboš Pástor & Pietro Veronesi, 2021. "Inequality Aversion, Populism, and the Backlash against Globalization," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 76(6), pages 2857-2906, December.
    33. Mitchell A. Petersen & Raghuram G. Rajan, 1995. "The Effect of Credit Market Competition on Lending Relationships," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 110(2), pages 407-443.
    34. Zhang, Ruixin & Ben Naceur, Sami, 2019. "Financial development, inequality, and poverty: Some international evidence," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 1-16.
    35. Levine, Ross & Lin, Chen & Xie, Wensi, 2016. "Spare tire? Stock markets, banking crises, and economic recoveries," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 120(1), pages 81-101.
    36. Oded Galor & Omer Moav, 2004. "From Physical to Human Capital Accumulation: Inequality and the Process of Development," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 71(4), pages 1001-1026.
    37. Buonanno, Paolo & Vargas, Juan F., 2019. "Inequality, crime, and the long run legacy of slavery," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 159(C), pages 539-552.
    38. Robin Burgess & Rohini Pande, 2005. "Do Rural Banks Matter? Evidence from the Indian Social Banking Experiment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(3), pages 780-795, June.
    39. Berger, Allen N. & Klapper, Leora F. & Martinez Peria, Maria Soledad & Zaidi, Rida, 2008. "Bank ownership type and banking relationships," Journal of Financial Intermediation, Elsevier, vol. 17(1), pages 37-62, January.
    40. Seven, Unal & Coskun, Yener, 2016. "Does financial development reduce income inequality and poverty? Evidence from emerging countries," Emerging Markets Review, Elsevier, vol. 26(C), pages 34-63.
    41. Allen N. Berger & Asli Demirgüč-Kunt & Joseph G. Haubrich & Ross Levine, 2004. "Introduction: Bank concentration and competition: an evolution in the making," Proceedings, Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, pages 433-451.
    42. Mohamed Chakroun, 2020. "Threshold effects in the relationship between financial development and income inequality," International Journal of Finance & Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 25(3), pages 365-387, July.
    43. Mavrotas, George & Vinogradov, Dmitri, 2007. "Financial sector structure and financial crisis burden," Journal of Financial Stability, Elsevier, vol. 3(4), pages 295-323, December.
    44. David Argente & Munseob Lee, 2021. "Cost of Living Inequality During the Great Recession," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 19(2), pages 913-952.
    45. Yihui Pan & Elena S. Pikulina & Stephan Siegel & Tracy Yue Wang, 2022. "Do Equity Markets Care about Income Inequality? Evidence from Pay Ratio Disclosure," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 77(2), pages 1371-1411, April.
    46. Beck, Thorsten & Levine, Ross, 2002. "Industry growth and capital allocation:*1: does having a market- or bank-based system matter?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 64(2), pages 147-180, May.
    47. Thorsten Beck & Ross Levine & Alexey Levkov, 2010. "Big Bad Banks? The Winners and Losers from Bank Deregulation in the United States," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 65(5), pages 1637-1667, October.
    48. Dmitri Vinogradov, 2011. "Banks, Credibility And Macroeconomic Evolution After A Production Shock," Manchester School, University of Manchester, vol. 79(3), pages 480-509, June.
    49. Arnoud W. A. Boot & Anjan V. Thakor, 2000. "Can Relationship Banking Survive Competition?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 55(2), pages 679-713, April.
    50. Kokas, Sotirios & Vinogradov, Dmitri & Zachariadis, Marios, 2020. "Which banks smooth and at what price?," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 65(C).
    51. Chemmanur, Thomas J & Fulghieri, Paolo, 1994. "Reputation, Renegotiation, and the Choice between Bank Loans and Publicly Traded Debt," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 7(3), pages 475-506.
    52. John C. Driscoll & Aart C. Kraay, 1998. "Consistent Covariance Matrix Estimation With Spatially Dependent Panel Data," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 80(4), pages 549-560, November.
    53. Boot, Arnoud W A & Thakor, Anjan V, 1997. "Financial System Architecture," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 10(3), pages 693-733.
    54. Philippe Aghion & Patrick Bolton, 1997. "A Theory of Trickle-Down Growth and Development," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 64(2), pages 151-172.
    55. Aggarwal, Raj & Goodell, John W., 2009. "Markets and institutions in financial intermediation: National characteristics as determinants," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 33(10), pages 1770-1780, October.
    56. Douglas W. Diamond, 1984. "Financial Intermediation and Delegated Monitoring," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 51(3), pages 393-414.
    57. John H. Boyd & Gianni De Nicoló, 2005. "The Theory of Bank Risk Taking and Competition Revisited," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 60(3), pages 1329-1343, June.
    58. David Martinez-Miera & Rafael Repullo, 2010. "Does Competition Reduce the Risk of Bank Failure?," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 23(10), pages 3638-3664, October.
    59. Vinogradov, Dmitri & Makhlouf, Yousef, 2021. "Two faces of financial systems: Provision of services versus shock-smoothing," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 75(C).
    60. Mauricio Larrain, 2015. "Editor's Choice Capital Account Opening and Wage Inequality," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 28(6), pages 1555-1587.
    61. Passant M. B. Selim & Hasan Güngör, 2021. "Inequality and financial development: Evidence from selected MENA region countries," International Journal of Finance & Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 26(2), pages 2732-2747, April.
    62. Stiglitz, Joseph E, 1969. "Distribution of Income and Wealth among Individuals," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 37(3), pages 382-397, July.
    63. Yongfen Shi & Sudeshna Paul & Sudharshan Reddy Paramati, 2022. "The impact of financial deepening on income inequality: Empirical evidence from Australia," International Journal of Finance & Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 27(3), pages 3564-3579, July.
    64. Chiu, Yi-Bin & Lee, Chien-Chiang, 2019. "Financial development, income inequality, and country risk," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 93(C), pages 1-18.
    65. repec:hal:pseose:halshs-01109372 is not listed on IDEAS
    66. Enrico Sette & Giorgio Gobbi, 2015. "Relationship Lending During A Financial Crisis," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 13(3), pages 453-481, June.
    67. Levine, Ross, 1991. "Stock Markets, Growth, and Tax Policy," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 46(4), pages 1445-1465, September.
    68. Thorsten Beck & Asli Demirgüç-Kunt & Ross Levine, 2007. "Finance, inequality and the poor," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 12(1), pages 27-49, March.
    69. Sanjeev Gupta & Hamid Davoodi & Rosa Alonso-Terme, 2002. "Does corruption affect income inequality and poverty?," Economics of Governance, Springer, vol. 3(1), pages 23-45, March.
    70. Stiglitz, Joseph E & Weiss, Andrew, 1981. "Credit Rationing in Markets with Imperfect Information," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 71(3), pages 393-410, June.
    71. Holmstrom, Bengt & Tirole, Jean, 1993. "Market Liquidity and Performance Monitoring," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 101(4), pages 678-709, August.
    72. Fonseca, Ana Rosa & González, Francisco, 2010. "How bank capital buffers vary across countries: The influence of cost of deposits, market power and bank regulation," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 34(4), pages 892-902, April.
    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. Vinogradov, Dmitri & Makhlouf, Yousef, 2021. "Two faces of financial systems: Provision of services versus shock-smoothing," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 75(C).
    2. Hsieh, Joyce & Chen, Ting-Cih & Lin, Shu-Chin, 2019. "Financial structure, bank competition and income inequality," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 450-466.
    3. Kokas, Sotirios & Vinogradov, Dmitri & Zachariadis, Marios, 2020. "Which banks smooth and at what price?," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 65(C).
    4. Brei, Michael & Jacolin, Luc & Noah, Alphonse, 2020. "Credit risk and bank competition in Sub-Saharan Africa," Emerging Markets Review, Elsevier, vol. 44(C).
    5. Tae-Sub Yun & Hee-Sun Bae & Il-Chul Moon & Deokjong Jeong, 2024. "The relationship between housing finance and inequality," Journal of Economic Interaction and Coordination, Springer;Society for Economic Science with Heterogeneous Interacting Agents, vol. 19(1), pages 151-191, January.
    6. Brei, Michael & Ferri, Giovanni & Gambacorta, Leonardo, 2023. "Financial structure and income inequality," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 131(C).
    7. Craig Burnside & Mario Cerrato & Zhekai Zhang, 2018. "Foreign exchange order fl ow as a risk factor," Working Papers 2018-03, Business School - Economics, University of Glasgow.
    8. Florian Leon, 2015. "What do we know about the role of bank competition in Africa?," CERDI Working papers halshs-01164864, HAL.
    9. Beck, T.H.L., 2011. "The Role of Finance in Economic Development : Benefits, Risks, and Politics," Discussion Paper 2011-141, Tilburg University, Center for Economic Research.
    10. Boot, Arnoud W. A., 2000. "Relationship Banking: What Do We Know?," Journal of Financial Intermediation, Elsevier, vol. 9(1), pages 7-25, January.
    11. Yousef Makhlouf & Neil M. Kellard & Dmitri V. Vinogradov, 2020. "Finance‐Inequality Nexus: The Long And The Short Of It," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 58(4), pages 1977-1994, October.
    12. Roya Taherifar & Mark J. Holmes & Gazi M. Hassan, 2023. "Does economic openness matter in the impact of financial development on income inequality?," Working Papers in Economics 23/04, University of Waikato.
    13. Nayab Akhtar & Abdul Rashid, 2024. "Financial development and sustainable development: A review of literature," Sustainable Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 32(6), pages 7114-7139, December.
    14. AMENDOLA, Adalgiso & BARRA, Cristian & BOCCIA, Marinella & PAPACCIO, Anna, 2018. "Market Structure and Financial Stability: Theory and Evidence," CELPE Discussion Papers 156, CELPE - CEnter for Labor and Political Economics, University of Salerno, Italy.
    15. D’Onofrio, Alexandra & Minetti, Raoul & Murro, Pierluigi, 2019. "Banking development, socioeconomic structure and income inequality," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 157(C), pages 428-451.
    16. Michael Chletsos & Andreas Sintos, 2023. "Financial development and income inequality: A meta‐analysis," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 37(4), pages 1090-1119, September.
    17. Blau, Benjamin M., 2018. "Income inequality, poverty, and the liquidity of stock markets," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 130(C), pages 113-126.
    18. Wu, Ji & Guo, Mengmeng & Chen, Minghua & Jeon, Bang Nam, 2019. "Market power and risk-taking of banks: Some semiparametric evidence from emerging economies," Emerging Markets Review, Elsevier, vol. 41(C).
    19. Berger, Allen N. & Boot, Arnoud W.A., 2024. "Financial intermediation services and competition analyses: Review and paths forward for improvement," Journal of Financial Intermediation, Elsevier, vol. 57(C).
    20. El Moussawi, Chawki & Mansour, Rana, 2022. "Competition, cost efficiency and stability of banks in the MENA region," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 84(C), pages 143-170.

    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:wly:ijfiec:v:30:y:2025:i:1:p:117-133. 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: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.interscience.wiley.com/jpages/1076-9307/ .

    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.