SGER: Topics in the Political Economy of Inequality

Yale University, New Haven CT

Investigators

Abstract

This exploratory research attempts to make three contributions to the literature on the political economy of inequality, using original data collection and dissemination, formal modeling, and microeconometric analysis. First, the research will collect and organized a panel data set on income inequality and poverty at the district level in India. This data set will be derived from the Indian National Sample Survey of 1983, 1987, 1993, and 1999. The PI has already constructed an algorithm to translate the national survey data into district level inequality indices. A major problem in research on poverty and inequality in developing countries is lack of adequate and reliable data at the sub-national level---levels at which policies are implemented. The construction of the district level poverty and inequality indices for India will contribute significantly to research on distribution and poverty in the development process. Second, the research uses the constructed data to examine whether large-scale public projects, such as the construction of dams, create inequality. Specifically, it investigates whether the geographical distribution of dams is influenced by politics and whether dam construction affects inequality and distribution across districts and through time. Third, the research investigates whether and how changes in equality and poverty affect the probability of ethnic and religious conflicts. The premise here is that ethnic and religious conflicts have economic causes and consequences. The inequality data constructed is used to test several interesting hypotheses about the initiation, duration, and intensity of ethnic and religious conflicts. Finally, the data collected will be used to investigate how economy-wide changes in income inequality affect the allocation of family resources along gender lines. Specifically, it will investigate how changes in economy-wide distribution of income affect parents' incentives to provide resources to their daughters and sons.