This thesis sheds light on the main aspects of economic inequality in the Iraqi Kurdistan. The main objective of this journey is to determine the reasons for the growing inequality in the period under study (2004-2010) in Iraqi Kurdistan, hoping to reach some conclusions which pave the way to researching it. Within this long journey, it has been argued that inequality is firstly inherited. Families have left different stores of abilities and skills to their children. However, this is not the only type of inheritance inequality. Part of the inheritance inequality has been caused by the nature of the economy and the political system, which have dominated in Iraq and Kurdistan during the last three decades. In the past, government intervention and massive regulation have been responsible for corruption and expanding inequality as a consequence, left another period of chaos. After removing Saddam, the political system has shifted to a free market, but without bringing the promised fruits for people. Corruption has a hand in expanding distances between individuals, social groups, and geographical areas. Though elements of corruption can be seen through distributing national incomes, an evaluation for the public policies tells us that even in the absence of corruption, inequality can be expanding. The culture of the labour market does not let the individuals perform well. It does not offer equal opportunities for two agents of the same age who hold the same certification. The traditional division of labour, between the market and the home, can still be observing. This division has made two types of market: the labour market and the marriage market. Women are socially encouraged to spend their energy and time on collecting the abilities that are necessary to make a good choice in the marriage market. The skills of the marriage market are clear: to be an honoured wife, who has had no previous relations with men and able to prepare food and take care of their children. Nevertheless, when they enter the labour market, they see another division: some jobs are for men, others for women. The official surveys, done by international organizations in accordance with the Ministry of Planning of both Iraq and Kurdistan, in addition to the two surveys conducted by the researcher, show that there has been a huge gap between urban and rural areas as well.

Published Article / The aim of this article is to examine the concept of poverty in terms of definition, types, causes, determinants and indicators. The relationship between inequality and poverty is also visited. The absolute and relative approaches to the definition of poverty are examined. Poverty is defined as the inability of individuals or households to attain sufficient resources to satisfy a socially acceptable minimum standard of living. Characteristics which determine poverty include individual, community, household and regional characteristics. Lack of access to basic services such as dwelling, electricity, water and sanitation was found to aggravate poverty. Socio-economic factors such as unemployment, education level, gender, income and household size also affect poverty. Causes, determinants and types of poverty must first be understood before poverty can be alleviated. Poverty remains a problem in South Africa twenty years after the transition to democracy. This article is thus intended to provide the public, politicians and policy makers with a better understanding of the word “poverty” and, therefore, help alleviation of poverty.

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This paper presents new empirical evidence on the determinants of corruption, focussing on the role of globalisation and inequality. The estimates for a panel of 102 countries over the period 1995-2005 point to three main results: (i) Detection technologies, reflected in a high level of development, human capital and political rights reduce corruption, whereas natural resource rents increase corruption; (ii) Globalisation (in terms of both trade and financial openness) has a negative effect on corruption, which is more pronounced in developing countries; (iii) Inequality increases corruption, and once the role of inequality is accounted for, the impact of globalisation on corruption is halved. In line with recent theory, this suggests that globalisation - besides reducing corruption through enhanced competition - affects corruption also by reducing inequality.

In this paper, I examine trends in salary inequality from the 1985-86 NBA season to the 2015-16 NBA season. Income and wealth inequality have been extremely important issues recently, which motivated me to analyze inequality in the NBA. I investigated if salary inequality trends in the NBA can be explained by either returns to skill or widening skill distributions. I used Pareto exponents to measure inequality levels and tested to see if the levels changed over the sample. Then, I estimated league-wide returns to skill. I found that returns to skill have not significantly changed, but variance in skill has increased. This result explained some of the variation in salary distributions. This could potentially influence future Collective Bargaining Agreements insofar as it provides an explanation for widening NBA salary distributions as opposed to a judgment whether greater levels of inequality is either good or bad for the NBA.

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