Concentration among the Rich

The aim of this paper is to examine the concentration of wealth among the group of top wealth holders, defined as those with wealth in excess of a high cut off. The paper begins by considering the definition of this cut off, analogous to the definition of a poverty line at the other end of the distribution. It then considers what can be learned about the proportion classified as ?rich? and about the concentration among the rich from four non-survey sources: journalists? lists, estate data, wealth tax data, and investment income tax data. It starts off from the world?s billionaires in 2006, but is particularly concerned with changes over time within countries, taking France, Germany, the UK, and the USA, to illustrate the different sources.wealth, inequality, assets, rich

Innovative Sources for Development Finance: Over-Arching Issues

development finance, international public finance, double dividend, fiscal architecture, development assistance

The Distribution of Top Incomes in Australia

Using taxation statistics, we estimate the income share held by top income groups in Australia over the period 1921-2002. We find that the income share of the richest fell from the 1920s until the mid-1940s, rose briefly in the post-war decade, and then declined until the early-1980s. During the 1980s and 1990s, top income shares rose rapidly. At the start of the twenty-first century, the income share of the richest was higher than it had been at any point in the previous fifty years. Among top income groups, recent decades have also seen a rise in the share of top income accruing to the super-rich. Trends in top income shares are similar to those observed among other elite groups, such as judges, politicians, top bureaucrats and CEOs. We speculate that changes in top income shares may have been affected by top marginal tax rates, skill-biased technological change, social norms about inequality, and the internationalisation of the market for English-speaking CEOs.inequality, Australia

Exclusion, Employment and Opportunity

The relationships between employment, education, opportunity, social exclusion and poverty are central to current policy debates. Atkinson argues that the concepts of poverty, unemployment and social exclusion are closely related, but are not the same. People may be poor without being socially excluded, and vice versa. Unemployment may cause poverty, but this can be prevented. Equally, marginal jobs do not ensure social inclusion. Britton argues that convential economic analysis misses a key part of the problem of unemployment: the role of work in providing self-esteem and non-material parts of human well-being. Hills examines whether new evidence on income mobility implies less worry about inequality and relative poverty. Some low income is transitory, but the 'poverty problem' discounting this remains 80-90 per cent of that shown by cross-section surveys. Machin finds that intergenerational mobility is limited in terms of earnings and education, and that childhood disadvantage has effects long into adult life and is an important factor in maintaining immobility of economic status across generations. Arulampalam and Booth suggest that there is a trade-off between expanding more marginal forms of employment and expanding the proportion of the workforce getting work-related training. Workers in temporary or short-term contracts, part-time, and non-unionised employment are less likely to receive work-related training. Green and colleagues compare 1986 and 1997 surveys to show that skill levels for British workers have been rising, not just in the qualifications needed to get jobs, but also in the skills actually used in them. There is no evidence of 'credentialism'.social exclusion, income mobility, employment, skills

FUNDING THE MILLENNIUM DEVELOPMENT GOALS. ESRI THIRTY-THIRD GEARY LECTURE, 2004

At the Millennium Summit in September 2000, the states of the United Nations set out a vision of a global partnership for development, directed at the achievement of specific targets. Specifically, 189 countries signed up to the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) summarised in Box 1. The concrete goals include the halving by 2015 of the proportion of people living in extreme poverty, halving the proportion hungry, and halving the proportion lacking access to safe drinking water. The objectives include the achievement of universal primary education and gender equality in education, the achievement by 2015 of a three-fourths decline in maternal mortality and a two-thirds decline in mortality among children under 5 years. They include halting and reversing the spread of HIV/AIDS and providing special assistance to AIDS orphans