M.Com. / Please refer to full text to view abstract

M.Com. / Please refer to full text to view abstract

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The purpose of this essay is to study what impact immigration has on the Swedish income distribution for the period 1992-2005. This essay uses a two-folded approach to study the income distribution, first, an income inequality measure will be investigated in order to find if the inequality increases or decreases by the increased immigration. Secondly, we estimate a quantile regression for the 10th, 50th and 90th percentiles for the period 1992, 1995, 2000 and2005, together with an OLS regression in order to find the income gap between the immigrants and natives, which is analysed for males and females separately. The study found that the inflow of immigrants increased income inequality in the lower tail of the income distribution. Immigrants at the upper tail of the income distribution are doing relatively better than the immigrants in the lower tail of the income distribution. Conclusively, independently of gender, the income gap between immigrants and natives is almost three times as large in the lower tail of the income distribution relative to the upper tail of the income distribution.

Este trabalho estima o efeito da polarização de renda sobre os índices de criminalidade para avaliar se a polarização é mais relevante que as medidas de desigualdade tradicionais na explicação da criminalidade. Para o cálculo da polarização foi utilizada a medida proposta por Duclos et al. (2004). Foram estimados modelos com dados de corte transversal e em painel, utilizando dados dos municípios paulistas, empregando-se modelos de auto-correlação espacial e System GMM. A principal conclusão deste trabalho é que a medida de polarização de renda tem efeito positivo e significativo sobre a taxa de crimes contra o patrimônio, assim como esperado inicialmente. Este resultado é robusto a alterações no peso do sentimento de identificação entre os indivíduos, α, e aos diferentes métodos econométricos e variáveis de renda utilizadas para calcular as medidas de desigualdade. / This paper estimates the effect of polarization of income on crime rates to assessing whether the polarization is more relevant than traditional measures of inequality in the explanation of crime. To calculate the polarization was used to measure proposed by Duclos et al. (2004). Models were estimated with cross-sectional and panel datas using models of spatial autocorrelation and System GMM. The main conclusion of this study is that the measure of income polarization has positive and significant effect on the rate of property crimes, as originally hoped. This result is robust to weight changes the feeling of identification among individuals, α, and different econometric methods and income variables used for calculate measures of inequality.

The purpose of this research is to discuss the "Rational Reform Plan on Public Servant Pension Income", systematic inquiries into the perception and manner of Penghu County public servants towards the reform plan, analyze the perception and manner differences by the public servants with different backgrounds, and propose conclusions and suggestions for a smooth and rational pension reformation. The objectives of this research are as follows: 1. Understand the perception and manner of Penghu County public servants towards the "Rational Reform Plan on Public Servant Pension Income"; 2. Understand the perception and manner differences by current and retired public servants towards the reform plan; 3. Understand if there is a difference in perception and manner by current public servants with different backgrounds; 4. Understand if there is a difference in perception and manner by retired public servants with different backgrounds; 5. Understand the feelings and suggestions of the Penghu County public servants towards the reform plan. This research is conducted with the literature analysis and questionnaire survey methods. Using current and retired public servants of Penghu County Government and respective institutions as the subjects, the number of sampling current public servants is 437 (distributed 437 questionnaire), 416 questionnaire is returned, the number of valid questionnaire is 404 and the ratio of valid questionnaire is 92.45%; the number of sampling retired public servants is 112 (distributed 112 questionnaire), 61 questionnaire is returned, the number of valid questionnaire is 56 and the ratio of valid questionnaire is 50%. This research obtains the below conclusions: 1. Most participants feel the domestic economic planning for senior is insufficient and approve to adopt gradual reduction of retired planning difference; 2. Most participants approve the reform concept but feel the plan content lacks fairness and the plan guidance is insufficient; 3. The participants have different views on whether the plan is helpful to the society, dignity of the public servants and national financial pressure; 4. The reform plan helps in easing early retirement but is afraid on letting unsuitable staff to remain in office and reduction of trust in the government; 5. The current and retired staff have different perceptions to the reform background and strategy planning; there is no perceptive difference in the strategy influence; 6. There is perceptive difference to the strategy background by current public servant of different ages, service seniority, positions, levels and institutions; different genders and education levels do not show any difference. 7. There is perceptive difference to the plan connotation by current public servant of different backgrounds; 8. There is perceptive difference to the strategy influence by current public servant of different genders, service seniority, education levels and positions; different ages, levels and institutions do not show any difference; 9. There is perceptive difference to the strategy background by retired staff of different genders, ages, service seniority, education levels and institutions; different positions and levels do not show any difference. 10. There is perceptive difference to the strategy influence by retired staff of different ages, service seniority, education levels and institutions; different genders, positions and levels do not show any difference. With the above conclusions, this research proposes the below suggestions: 1. More professional and less politics in the civil system reform; 2. Pension income reform is not to be pursued to maintain good faith in the government; 3. The reform plan should be legalized before implementing; 4. Review before revision of irrational reform stipulations; 5. Integrated measures and advance announcement; 6. Early planning of old age economic planning system; 7. Planning of retirement and social welfare system; 8. Public servants should plan lifetime income to safeguard old age.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2001. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 279-292). Available also in a digital version from Dissertation Abstracts.

Thesis (M. Soc. Sc.)--University of Hong Kong, 1985.

Billions of dollars in development aid are sent to developing countries every year. Weak institutions in recipient countries are the main impediments often discussed to prevent aid from reaching the intended targets. At the same time, they also hinder aid effectiveness in improving the lives of the people. This dissertation argues that the impact of aid on income distribution and human welfare in recipient countries differs by their institutional quality. Institutions encompass many different dimensions. This dissertation focuses on: corruption in government, quality of bureaucracy, and the rule of law. This study explores the impact in two essays. The first essay investigates the role of institutions in aid distribution. In particular, we examine the interplay between aid and institutions on income shares of different population groups (measured by income quintiles), and on the gap between the rich and the poor (measured by the Gini coefficient). The study uses Principal Component Analysis to construct an institutional index from the three components: corruption, bureaucratic quality, and the rule of law. Employing Two-Stage Least Squares (2SLS) methodology on a panel data of 85 countries from 1960 to 2004, this study finds that an increase in aid as a percentage of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) decreases the income shares of the poor (quintile 1 and quintile 2), but increases that of the rich (quintile 5), thereby widening the gap between the rich and the poor (Gini coefficient). Contrary to our main hypothesis, though, recipient countries’ institutions do not play any role in aid distribution. Similarly, the second essay also focuses on the importance of recipient institutions, but it assesses aid effectiveness in improving human welfare. The study considers five human development indicators: the Human Development Index (HDI), the health index, the infant mortality rate, the education index, and the average years of schooling. The study empirically tests the hypothesis by utilizing the same methodology as in the first essay, but on a panel of 80 countries from 1980 to 2004. The findings suggest that human welfare in recipient countries improves as aid increases. The improvement appears to be driven more by the health than the education sector. Furthermore, aid is more effective in countries with poorer institutional quality, which is contrary to the hypothesis. However, the results are not consistent when taking into account government’s pro-poor public expenditure.

This dissertation studies households' housing decision in the presence of income risks, and its implication on within-cohort income/consumption inequality and the nature of income risks facing households. It is composed of three chapters. The first chapter presents evidence from Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) and Consumer Expenditure Survey (PSID) that housing consumption and housing investment are negatively affected by income risks. Within a household portfolio choice model, the negative effect can be attributed to the illiquidity of housing investment and the positive correlation between house price and income. The second chapter provides empirical evidence that the secular rise of income and consumption inequalities in the United States is age-dependent. It is more significant among younger households. With this feature, biasedness arises from the traditional methodology of decomposing inequality into age effect, year effect and cohort effect. A simple but effective remedy for the problem is proposed. The third chapter of the dissertation studies the age-profile of within-cohort income/consumption inequality, using the methodology proposed in the second chapter. It documents the age-profile of housing consumption inequality which is almost flat. This stands in contrast to the well-documented fact that within-cohort nonhousing consumption inequality rises with age, which has been argued to be evidence for persistent, uninsurable income shocks to households. This argument is challenged by the finding that housing consumption inequality has a flat age-profile. Within the framework of standard lifecycle model, the coexistence of rising nonhousing consumption inequality and flat housing consumption inequality constitutes a puzzle. A potential resolution lies in the negative effect of income uncertainty on housing decision which diminishes with age, as shown in the first chapter of the dissertation. / text