Growth and Inequality: The Case of Indonesia, 1960-1997

This paper investigates whether the ‘Kuznets hypothesis’, that economic growth from low levels of GDP per capita is initially associated with an increase in income inequality and later followed by a decline in inequality, is supported by evidence for a less-developed country, Indonesia. The paper outlines the relevant features of the process of rapid growth and structural change, in particular industrialisation since the 1960s. It notes the possible consequences of this process for changes in income distribution, and draws on disparate sets of statistical data to trace trends in income inequality in Indonesia. The paper concludes that the evidence for Indonesia suggests an increase in inequality during the 1970s and a subsequent decrease of inequality until 1997. A comparison of the evidence with historical data for the UK and Japan suggests that income inequality in Indonesia was relatively low.income inequality; Kuznets hypothesis; Indonesia; economic development

Economic benefits from colonial assets : the case of the Netherlands and Indonesia 1870-1958

This paper explores the question whether and to what extent the economic relations between the Netherlands and its former colony Indonesia could be crucial to explaining `metropolitan' economic development and `peripheral' underdevelopment. It first surveys the literature on economic explanations for imperialism and the historiography involving Netherlands-Indonesia relations. The paper then generalises the broad economic importance to the Dutch economy of having Indonesia as a colony. The paper argues that the economic relevance shifted from trade to financial relations since ca.1900. Ready access to the Dutch capital market is likely to have advantaged economic development in Indonesia, albeit at the price of a shift in company ownership and a continuous transfer of dividend and interest payments to the Netherlands. The Dutch economy benefited from the relations with Indonesia, but was not particularly dependent on this relationship. This is demonstrated by the fact that after the decolonisation of Indonesia the economic ties between the two countries were severed during the 1950s. The Dutch economy entered a period of rapid growth, while the loss of ready access to the Dutch capital market contributed to economic stagnation in Indonesia.

A resource-advantage perspective on pricing: shifting the focus from ends to means-end in pricing research?

This paper contributes to a long-lasting debate between practitioners who argue that academia is unable to understand what pricing is all about and academics who criticize practitioner pricing approaches for lacking rigor or rationality. The paper conceptualizes a resource-advantage (R-A) perspective on pricing by drawing on the R-A theory of competition. After a review of R-A theory, the paper integrates the price discretion concept and pricing as a spanning competence by introducing a separation between resources that create and resources that extract value, thereby expanding R-A theory to pricing. The perspective aims to shed light on how the process of competition helps organizations to learn/benefit from pricing capabilities. The research shifts the focus of pricing research from an equilibrium-based static view to a dynamic, disequilibrium-provoking pricing competence. In this way, it draws attention to what is perhaps most relevant to pricing in practice: the actual means necessary to determine price

Ranking the Schools: How Quality Information Affects School Choice in the Netherlands

This paper analyzes whether information on high school quality published by a national newspaper affects school choice in the Netherlands. For this purpose, we use both school level and individual student level data. First, we study the causal effect of quality scores on the influx of new high school students using a longitudinal school dataset. We find that negative (positive) school quality scores decrease (increase) the number of students choosing a school after the year of publication. The positive effects are particularly large for the academic school track. An academic school track receiving the most positive score sees its inflow of students rise by 15 to 20 students. Second, we study individual school choice behaviour to address the relative importance of the quality scores, as well as potential differences in the quality response between socio-economic groups. Although the probability of attending a school is affected by its quality score, it is mainly driven by the travelling distance. Students are only willing to travel about 200 meters more in order to attend a well-performing rather than an average school. In contrast to equity concerns that are often raised, we cannot find differences in information responses between socio-economic groups.school quality, school choice, information, media

From strangers to partners in the hemisphere: New Prospects in Australia’s Economic Relations with Latin America

From marginal relevance, the trade and business relations between Australia and Latin America have grown during the past two decades. A proximate reason is that they diversified to encompass a greater range of manufactures and services. Differences in the business environments of Australia and Latin America remain that are obstacles to further expansion of these relations. The ultimate reason for the growth and diversification of these relations is that Australia and its key business partners in Latin America (Argentina, Brazil, Chile and Mexico) experienced the impact of processes of trade liberalisation, market deregulation and structural reform during the past two decades. Australia and these Latin American countries now share common interests in fostering business relations, for which there are opportunities at multilateral, plurilateral and bilateral levels.Trade, Investment, Australia, Latin America, Economic Relations

School Responsiveness to Quality Rankings: An Empirical Analysis of Secondary Education in the Netherlands

This paper analyzes the response of secondary schools to changes in their quality ratings. The current analysis is the first to address the impact of quality scores that have been published by a newspaper (Trouw), rather than public interventions. Our research design exploits the substantial lags in the registration and publication of the Trouw scores and that takes into account all possible outcomes of the ratings, instead of the lowest category only. Overall, we find evidence that school quality performance does respond to Trouw quality scores. Both average grades increase and the number of diplomas go up after receiving a negative score. For schools that receive the most negative ranking, the short-term effects (one year after a change in the ranking of schools) of quality transparency on final exam grades equal 10% to 30% of a standard deviation compared to the average of this variable. The estimated long run impacts are roughly equal to the short-term effects that are measured.school quality, school accountability

Top Incomes in Indonesia, 1920-2004

Using taxation and household survey data, this paper estimates top income shares for Indonesia during 1920-2004. Our results suggest that top income shares grew during the 1920s and 1930s, but fell in the post-war era. In more recent decades, we observe a sharp rise in top income shares during the late-1990s, coincident with the economic downturn, and some evidence that top income shares fell in the early-2000s. For pre-war Indonesia, we decompose top income shares by income source, and find that for groups below the top 0.5 percent, a majority of income was derived from wages. Throughout the twentieth century, top income shares in Indonesia have been higher than in India, broadly comparable to Japan, and somewhat lower than levels prevailing in the United States.inequality, top incomes, personal income taxation, Indonesia

Ranking the schools: How quality information affects school choice in the Netherlands

Both school level and individual student level data indicate that information on highschool quality published by a national newspaper affects school choice in the Netherlands. The positive effects are particularly large for the academic school track. First, we study the causal effect of quality scores on the influx of new highschool students using a longitudinal school dataset. We find that negative (positive) school quality scores decrease (increase) the number of students choosing a school after the year of publication. An academic school track receiving the most positive score sees its inflow of students rise by 15 to 20 students. Second, we study individual school choice behavior to address the relative importance of the quality scores, as well as potential differences in the quality response between socio-economic groups. Although the probability of attending a school is affected by its quality score, it is mainly driven by the traveling distance. Students are willing to travel only about 200 meters more to attend a well-performing rather than an average school. In contrast to equity concerns that are often raised, we cannot find differences in information responses between socio-economic groups.

Trends in social indicators and social sector financing

Over the past three decades, per capita GDP has increased worldwide. The authors examine whether this has resulted in better quality of life in developing countries. This paper documents the evolution of social indicators (health, education, nutrition), private consumption, and government expenditure on the social sectors. They conclude that developing countries made uneven progress in the quality of life in the period under study. Key findings include: (a) health indicators showed stable improvements in all regions, but Africa's rates were the slowest; (b) of all social indicators, education made the greatest gains, however, net enrollment ratios actually decreased in Africa in the 1980s; (c) while developing nations as a group enjoyed improved indices of undernutrition in 1965-85, the degree of undernutrition worsened in more than one-third of sub-Saharan African countries; (d) Africa and Latin America and the Caribbean also saw declines in average per capita private consumption during the 1980s; and (e) the share of total government expenditure on health remained stable in all regions, but that of education declined in Africa, South Asia, and Latin America and the Caribbean. The authors also note that any effort to assess trends is severely hampered by lack of information. The quality of existing data is not systematically trustworthy, and there are many gaps.Health Economics&Finance,Early Childhood Development,Demographics,Health Monitoring&Evaluation,Early Child and Children's Health

Historical perspectives on Asian economic growth and development

The papers featured in this special issue are based on presentations made at the Harvard–Hitotsubashi–Warwick Conference on "Economic Change Around the Indian Ocean in the Very Long Run", held at the University of Warwick in Venice, Palazzo Pesaro Papafava, 22–24 July 2008. The conference was originally conceived with countries around the Indian Ocean in mind, but soon expanded to include East Asia, and this wider geographical coverage is reflected in the papers included here. The conference was organised by Stephen Broadberry (Warwick), Kyoji Fukao (Hitotsubashi), Bishnupriya Gupta (Warwick) and Jeffrey Williamson (Harvard), and generously financed by the University of Warwick, Hitotsubashi University and the Economic History Society. A central aim of the organisers was to bring together researchers seeking to break free from the constraints of both the older Eurocentric and the nationalistic anti-colonialist literatures which have dominated much of the economic history of Asian countries. There was also a desire to encourage work which is quantitative and uses economic analysis, and which can be used to shed historical light on the current economic performance of the region