The consumption, income, and wealth of the poorest: An empirical analysis of economic inequality in rural and urban Sub-Saharan Africa for macroeconomists

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: De Magalhaes, Leandro; Santaeulalia-Llopis, Raul
• 署名单位: University of Bristol
• 刊物名称: JOURNAL OF DEVELOPMENT ECONOMICS
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0304-3878
• DOI: 10.1016/j.jdeveco.2018.05.014
• 发表日期: 2018
• 页码: 350-371
• 关键词: macroeconomy; consumption; income; WEALTH; Sub-Saharan Africa; INEQUALITY; cross-sectional data; panel data; accumulation; insurance

摘要

We provide new empirical insights on the joint distribution of consumption, income, and wealth using cross-sectional and panel household-survey data from three of the poorest countries in the world Malawi, Tanzania, and Uganda all located in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). Our main contribution is to establish the co-existence of two phenomena in SSA: (i) a low transmission from income inequality to wealth inequality (i.e., low accumulation); and (ii) a low transmission from income inequality to consumption inequality (i.e., high consumption insurance). The variation between rural and urban areas in SSA and between SSA and the United States of America reveals a negative relationship, and potentially, a trade-off between accumulation and consumption insurance.