IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/wbk/wbrwps/6842.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Growth, inequality, and social welfare : cross-country evidence

Author

Listed:
  • Dollar, David
  • Kleineberg, Tatjana
  • Kraay, Aart

Abstract

Social welfare functions that assign weights to individuals based on their income levels can be used to document the relative importance of growth and inequality changes for changes in social welfare. In a large panel of industrial and developing countries over the past 40 years, most of the cross-country and over-time variation in changes in social welfare is due to changes in average incomes. In contrast, the changes in inequality observed during this period are on average much smaller than changes in average incomes, are uncorrelated with changes in average incomes, and have contributed relatively little to changes in social welfare.

Suggested Citation

  • Dollar, David & Kleineberg, Tatjana & Kraay, Aart, 2014. "Growth, inequality, and social welfare : cross-country evidence," Policy Research Working Paper Series 6842, The World Bank.
    • Handle: RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:6842
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www-wds.worldbank.org/external/default/WDSContentServer/WDSP/IB/2014/04/24/000158349_20140424130332/Rendered/PDF/WPS6842.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. José De Gregorio & Jong–Wha Lee, 2002. "Education and Income Inequality: New Evidence From Cross‐Country Data," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 48(3), pages 395-416, September.
    2. Susanto Basu & Luigi Pascali & Fabio Schiantarelli & Luis Serven, 2022. "Productivity and the Welfare of Nations," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 20(4), pages 1647-1682.
    3. Dirk Krueger & Fabrizio Perri, 2004. "On the Welfare Consequences of the Increase in Inequality in the United States," NBER Chapters, in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 2003, Volume 18, pages 83-138, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. Amartya Sen, 1976. "Real National Income," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 43(1), pages 19-39.
    5. Shaohua Chen & Martin Ravallion, 2010. "The Developing World is Poorer than We Thought, But No Less Successful in the Fight Against Poverty," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 125(4), pages 1577-1625.
    6. Carmen Fernandez & Eduardo Ley & Mark F. J. Steel, 2001. "Model uncertainty in cross-country growth regressions," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 16(5), pages 563-576.
    7. Fernandez, Carmen & Ley, Eduardo & Steel, Mark F. J., 2001. "Benchmark priors for Bayesian model averaging," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 100(2), pages 381-427, February.
    8. William Hauk & Romain Wacziarg, 2009. "A Monte Carlo study of growth regressions," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 14(2), pages 103-147, June.
    9. Martin Feldkircher & Stefan Zeugner, 2009. "Benchmark Priors Revisited: On Adaptive Shrinkage and the Supermodel Effect in Bayesian Model Averaging," IMF Working Papers 2009/202, International Monetary Fund.
    10. Daniele Checchi & Cecilia García-Peñalosa, 2008. "Labour market institutions and income inequality [‘Globalisation and the great U-turn: Income inequality trends in 16 OECD countries’]," Economic Policy, CEPR, CESifo, Sciences Po;CES;MSH, vol. 23(56), pages 602-649.
    11. Angus Deaton & Valerie Kozel, 2005. "Data and Dogma: The Great Indian Poverty Debate," The World Bank Research Observer, World Bank, vol. 20(2), pages 177-199.
    12. Datt, Gaurav & Ravallion, Martin, 1992. "Growth and redistribution components of changes in poverty measures : A decomposition with applications to Brazil and India in the 1980s," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 38(2), pages 275-295, April.
    13. Dollar, David & Kraay, Aart, 2002. "Growth Is Good for the Poor," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 7(3), pages 195-225, September.
    14. Kraay, Aart, 2006. "When is growth pro-poor? Evidence from a panel of countries," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 80(1), pages 198-227, June.
    15. Xavier Sala-I-Martin & Gernot Doppelhofer & Ronald I. Miller, 2004. "Determinants of Long-Term Growth: A Bayesian Averaging of Classical Estimates (BACE) Approach," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(4), pages 813-835, September.
    16. Samuel Bazzi & Michael A. Clemens, 2013. "Blunt Instruments: Avoiding Common Pitfalls in Identifying the Causes of Economic Growth," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 5(2), pages 152-186, April.
    17. Manuel Arellano & Stephen Bond, 1991. "Some Tests of Specification for Panel Data: Monte Carlo Evidence and an Application to Employment Equations," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 58(2), pages 277-297.
    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. Dollar, David & Kleineberg, Tatjana & Kraay, Aart, 2016. "Growth still is good for the poor," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 81(C), pages 68-85.
    2. 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.
    3. Martin Ravallion, 2013. "The Idea of Antipoverty Policy," NBER Working Papers 19210, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. Capolupo, Rosa, 2009. "The New Growth Theories and Their Empirics after Twenty Years," Economics - The Open-Access, Open-Assessment E-Journal (2007-2020), Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel), vol. 3, pages 1-72.
    5. Leon-Gonzalez, Roberto & Vinayagathasan, Thanabalasingam, 2015. "Robust determinants of growth in Asian developing economies: A Bayesian panel data model averaging approach," Journal of Asian Economics, Elsevier, vol. 36(C), pages 34-46.
    6. Facundo Alvaredo & Leonardo Gasparini, 2013. "Recent Trends in Inequality and Poverty in Developing Countries," CEDLAS, Working Papers 0151, CEDLAS, Universidad Nacional de La Plata.
    7. Tarlok Singh, 2022. "Economic growth and the state of poverty in India: sectoral and provincial perspectives," Economic Change and Restructuring, Springer, vol. 55(3), pages 1251-1302, August.
    8. Jetter, Michael & Parmeter, Christopher F., 2018. "Sorting through global corruption determinants: Institutions and education matter – Not culture," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 109(C), pages 279-294.
    9. Antonio Ciccone & Marek Jarociński, 2010. "Determinants of Economic Growth: Will Data Tell?," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 2(4), pages 222-246, October.
    10. León-González, Roberto & Montolio, Daniel, 2015. "Endogeneity and panel data in growth regressions: A Bayesian model averaging approach," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 23-39.
    11. Ley, Eduardo & Steel, Mark F.J., 2012. "Mixtures of g-priors for Bayesian model averaging with economic applications," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 171(2), pages 251-266.
    12. Jesus Crespo Cuaresma & Bettina Grün & Paul Hofmarcher & Stefan Humer & Mathias Moser, 2015. "A Comprehensive Approach to Posterior Jointness Analysis in Bayesian Model Averaging Applications," Department of Economics Working Papers wuwp193, Vienna University of Economics and Business, Department of Economics.
    13. Roberto Leon-Gonzalez & Daniel Montolio, 2004. "Growth, convergence and public investment. A Bayesian model averaging approach," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 36(17), pages 1925-1936.
    14. Aart Kraay & Norikazu Tawara, 2013. "Can specific policy indicators identify reform priorities?," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 18(3), pages 253-283, September.
    15. Martin Ravallion, 2012. "Why Don't We See Poverty Convergence?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(1), pages 504-523, February.
    16. Crespo Cuaresma, Jesus & von Schweinitz, Gregor & Wendt, Katharina, 2019. "On the empirics of reserve requirements and economic growth," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 60(C), pages 253-274.
    17. Jesús Crespo Cuaresma & Martin Feldkircher, 2013. "Spatial Filtering, Model Uncertainty And The Speed Of Income Convergence In Europe," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 28(4), pages 720-741, June.
    18. Klump, R. & Prüfer, P., 2006. "Prioritizing Policies for Pro-Poor Growth : Applying Bayesian Model Averaging to Vietnam," Other publications TiSEM dc14add6-f581-4eea-92dd-3, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    19. Mark F. J. Steel, 2020. "Model Averaging and Its Use in Economics," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 58(3), pages 644-719, September.
    20. Bruns, Stephan B. & Ioannidis, John P.A., 2020. "Determinants of economic growth: Different time different answer?," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 63(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Inequality; Achieving Shared Growth; Economic Conditions and Volatility; Economic Theory&Research; Equity and Development;
    All these keywords.

    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:wbk:wbrwps:6842. 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: Roula I. Yazigi (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/dvewbus.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.