IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/osf/osfxxx/5sczh.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Re-examining the Link Between Economic Growth and Income Inequality in Sub-Saharan African Countries: Do Natural Resource Endowments Matter?

Author

Listed:
  • Oumarou, Mohamadou
  • Sali, Oumarou
  • Hamadou, Alioum

Abstract

Do natural resource endowments influence the relationship between economic growth and income inequality in Sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries? This is the main question of this article. To this end, we use polynomial non-linear modeling and non-parametric and semi-parametric modeling applied to a panel of 43 SSA countries between 2000 and 2020. The data used come from World Development Indicators (WDI) and the University of Texas Inequality Project. In order to enrich the empirical literature on the subject, four indices measure income inequality in the econometric tests. All other things being equal, the results show that the growth-inequality link is non-linear, with a positive trend that changes convexity with the level of growth. Rents from non-renewable natural resources (oil, gas and other minerals) accentuate the negative effect of growth on inequality, while income from renewable resources (water and forests) has the effect of reducing inequality. Furthermore, these results show that rents from a single product (a single natural resource) have no impact on inequality. On the other hand, income from the export of several natural resources accentuates the effect of growth on inequality. Consequently, SSA countries need to put in place a general policy to reduce inequalities and a strategy to reduce their dependence on the exploitation of natural resources. This can be achieved through the structural transformation of economies and the development of global value chains.

Suggested Citation

  • Oumarou, Mohamadou & Sali, Oumarou & Hamadou, Alioum, 2024. "Re-examining the Link Between Economic Growth and Income Inequality in Sub-Saharan African Countries: Do Natural Resource Endowments Matter?," OSF Preprints 5sczh, Center for Open Science.
    • Handle: RePEc:osf:osfxxx:5sczh
    DOI: 10.31219/osf.io/5sczh
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://osf.io/download/66e82969aee31b2bbb1c40fa/
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.31219/osf.io/5sczh?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. Alesina, Alberto & Perotti, Roberto, 1996. "Income distribution, political instability, and investment," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 40(6), pages 1203-1228, June.
    2. Nathalie Scholl & Stephan Klasen, 2019. "Re-estimating the relationship between inequality and growth," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 71(4), pages 824-847.
    3. Muhammad Shahbaz, 2010. "Income inequality‐economic growth and non‐linearity: a case of Pakistan," International Journal of Social Economics, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 37(8), pages 613-636, July.
    4. Markus Brueckner & Daniel Lederman, 2018. "Inequality and economic growth: the role of initial income," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 23(3), pages 341-366, September.
    5. Ferdinand Niyimbanira, 2017. "Analysis of the Impact of Economic Growth on Income Inequality and Poverty in South Africa: The Case of Mpumalanga Province," International Journal of Economics and Financial Issues, Econjournals, vol. 7(4), pages 254-261.
    6. Abdulrasheed Zakari & Vincent Tawiah, 2019. "Impact of Electricity Consumption, Financial Development, Trade Openness on CO2 Emissions: Evidence from Nigeria," Economic Studies journal, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences - Economic Research Institute, issue 4, pages 143-157.
    7. Mignamissi, Dieudonné & Malah Kuete, Yselle Flora, 2021. "Resource rents and happiness on a global perspective: The resource curse revisited," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 71(C).
    8. Kristin J. Forbes, 2000. "A Reassessment of the Relationship between Inequality and Growth," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 90(4), pages 869-887, September.
    9. Robert Breunig & Omer Majeed, 2020. "Inequality, poverty and economic growth," International Economics, CEPII research center, issue 161, pages 83-99.
    10. Federico Cingano, 2014. "Trends in Income Inequality and its Impact on Economic Growth," OECD Social, Employment and Migration Working Papers 163, OECD Publishing.
    11. Daniel Halter & Manuel Oechslin & Josef Zweimüller, 2014. "Inequality and growth: the neglected time dimension," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 19(1), pages 81-104, March.
    12. Matías Braun & Francisco Parro & Patricio Valenzuela, 2019. "Does Finance Alter The Relation Between Inequality And Growth?," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 57(1), pages 410-428, January.
    13. Jauch, Sebastian & Watzka, Sebastian, 2016. "Financial development and income inequality: a panel data approach," Munich Reprints in Economics 43505, University of Munich, Department of Economics.
    14. Muhammad Shahbaz, 2010. "Income inequality‐economic growth and non‐linearity: a case of Pakistan," International Journal of Social Economics, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 37(8), pages 613-636, July.
    15. Thomas Piketty, 1997. "The Dynamics of the Wealth Distribution and the Interest Rate with Credit Rationing," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 64(2), pages 173-189.
    16. Majeed, Muhammad Tariq, 2016. "Economic Growth and Income Inequality Nexus: An Empirical Analysis for Pakistan," MPRA Paper 89705, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    17. Thomas Lemieux, 2006. "Increasing Residual Wage Inequality: Composition Effects, Noisy Data, or Rising Demand for Skill?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 96(3), pages 461-498, June.
    18. Gustavo A. Marrero & Luis Servén, 2022. "Growth, inequality and poverty: a robust relationship?," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 63(2), pages 725-791, August.
    19. Mohamed Salah Mansour & Miriam Wendel, 2015. "Finance and Inequality – Evidence from East Asia," Eurasian Journal of Economics and Finance, Eurasian Publications, vol. 3(3), pages 1-16.
    20. Lant Pritchett, 2001. "Where Has All the Education Gone?," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 15(3), pages 367-36-391.
    21. Barro, Robert J, 2000. "Inequality and Growth in a Panel of Countries," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 5(1), pages 5-32, March.
    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. repec:osf:osfxxx:5sczh_v1 is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Kholeka Mdingi & Sin-Yu Ho, 2023. "Income inequality and economic growth: An empirical investigation in South Africa," Cogent Economics & Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 11(2), pages 2230027-223, June.
    3. Mohamed Ali Labidi & Anis Ochi & Yosra Saidi, 2024. "Extreme Poverty, Economic Growth, and Income Inequality Trilogy in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia: A GMM Panel VAR Approach," Journal of the Knowledge Economy, Springer;Portland International Center for Management of Engineering and Technology (PICMET), vol. 15(3), pages 10592-10612, September.
    4. Anis Ochi & Mohamed Ali Labidi & Yosra Saidi, 2024. "The Nexus Between Pro-poor Growth, Inequality, Institutions and Poverty: Evidence from Low and Middle Income Developing Countries," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 172(2), pages 703-739, March.
    5. Ademola Obafemi Young, 2019. "Growth Impacts of Income Inequality: Empirical Evidence From Nigeria," Research in World Economy, Research in World Economy, Sciedu Press, vol. 10(3), pages 226-262, December.
    6. Alex O. Acheampong & Tomiwa Sunday Adebayo & Janet Dzator & Isaac Koomson, 2023. "Income inequality and economic growth in BRICS: insights from non-parametric techniques," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 21(3), pages 619-640, September.
    7. Facchini, François & Jaeck, Louis & Kratou, Hajer, 2024. "The growth-inequality debate revisited by rent-seeking theory: Some empirical evidence," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 84(C).
    8. Ms. Valerie Cerra & Mr. Ruy Lama & Norman Loayza, 2021. "Links Between Growth, Inequality, and Poverty: A Survey," IMF Working Papers 2021/068, International Monetary Fund.
    9. Blotevogel, Robert & Imamoglu, Eslem & Moriyama, Kenji & Sarr, Babacar, 2022. "Income inequality measures and economic growth channels," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 72(C).
    10. Devdatta Ray & Mikael Linden, 2018. "Health, inequality and income: a global study using simultaneous model," Journal of Economic Structures, Springer;Pan-Pacific Association of Input-Output Studies (PAPAIOS), vol. 7(1), pages 1-28, December.
    11. Seher Gülşah Topuz, 2022. "The Relationship Between Income Inequality and Economic Growth: Are Transmission Channels Effective?," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 162(3), pages 1177-1231, August.
    12. Elina Tuominen, 2024. "Top-end inequality and growth: empirical exploration of nonlinearities and the time dimension," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 22(2), pages 311-331, June.
    13. Mehmet Balcilar & Rangan Gupta & Wei Ma & Philton Makena, 2021. "Income inequality and economic growth: A re‐examination of theory and evidence," Review of Development Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 25(2), pages 737-757, May.
    14. Köppl-Turyna, Monika & Christl, Michael & De Poli, Silvia, 2024. "Does redistribution hurt growth? An empirical assessment of the redistribution-growth relationship in the European Union," Research Papers 27, EcoAustria – Institute for Economic Research.
    15. Le, Vo Phuong Mai & Meenagh, David & Minford, Patrick & Wang, Hankui, 2025. "UK Economic Growth and Inequality from 1870," Cardiff Economics Working Papers E2025/7, Cardiff University, Cardiff Business School, Economics Section.
    16. Tsun Se Cheong & Guanghua Wan & David Kam Hung Chui, 2022. "Unveiling the Relationship between Economic Growth and Equality for Developing Countries," China & World Economy, Institute of World Economics and Politics, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, vol. 30(5), pages 1-28, September.
    17. Brida, Juan Gabriel & Carrera, Edgar J. Sanchez & Segarra, Verónica, 2020. "Clustering and regime dynamics for economic growth and income inequality," Structural Change and Economic Dynamics, Elsevier, vol. 52(C), pages 99-108.
    18. 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.
    19. José Carlos Coelho & José Alves, 2021. "How inequality drives growth: an investigation of the transmission channels for OECD countries," Working Papers REM 2021/0194, ISEG - Lisbon School of Economics and Management, REM, Universidade de Lisboa.
    20. Hailemariam Abebe & Dzhumashev Ratbek, 2020. "Income Inequality and Economic Growth: Heterogeneity and Nonlinearity," Studies in Nonlinear Dynamics & Econometrics, De Gruyter, vol. 24(3), pages 1-15, June.
    21. Mohamed Ali Chroufa & Nouri Chtourou, 2022. "Inequality and Growth in Tunisia: New Evidence from Threshold Regression," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 163(2), pages 901-924, September.

    More about this item

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:osf:osfxxx:5sczh. 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: OSF (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://osf.io/preprints/ .

    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.