Finance, inequality, and poverty : cross-country evidence / Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirgu-Kunt, Ross Levine.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Beck, Thorsten.

Contributor:

National Bureau of Economic Research.

Demirguc-Kunt, Asli.

Levine, Ross.

Series:

Policy research working papers.

Working paper series (National Bureau of Economic Research : Online) ; working paper no. 10979.

World Bank e-Library.

NBER working paper series ; working paper 10979

Language:

English

Physical Description:

1 online resource: illustrations (black and white);

Other Title:

NBER working paper series vol. working paper 10979

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, MA : National Bureau of Economic Research, c2004

System Details:

data file

Summary:

"While substantial research finds that financial development boosts overall economic growth, we study whether financial development disproportionately raises the incomes of the poor and alleviates poverty. Using a broad cross-country sample, we distinguish among competing theoretical predictions about the impact of financial development on changes in income distribution and poverty alleviation. We find that financial development reduces income inequality by disproportionately boosting the incomes of the poor. Countries with better-developed financial intermediaries experience faster declines in measures of both poverty and income inequality. These results are robust to controlling for other country characteristics and potential reverse causality"--National Bureau of Economic Research web site.

Notes:

Print version record

December 2004.

Includes bibliographical references.

Publisher Number:

10.1596/1813-9450-3338