The purpose of this PhD thesis is to make a contribution to existing knowledge in the field of critical accounting by studying credit mechanisms and their link to income/wealth inequality in Sri Lankan society and the role of accounting technology in facilitating such mechanisms. The literature review revealed that: a) Global inequality is aggravated by the disparity of economic development which is possible only through state intervention; b) Unemployment is considered as a dilemma for economic development in developing countries by most politicians/administrators/researchers; c) In any country, around 60-70 percent of employment is generated by small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) and; d) Their major problem is access to credit. This research was designed to find out how the credit system works and why certain SMEs do not have adequate access to credit to develop their businesses; to provide employment; to increase the share of national income to the lower income groups; to narrow down the gap between the rich and poor within and between countries. A case study research approach was followed to extract data on real-life experiences of the research participants. Reliability of data was ensured by using various verification techniques and maximum efforts were made to balance the two extremes of validity of the research; internal and external. The extent of representation by the cases and the bank was tested, and judged as high, with 12-14 characteristics common to the Sri Lankan credit culture and banking industry respectively. Marxian critical theories were used for theoretical guidance throughout the research. The three case studies provide empirical evidence for the existence of the discriminatory nature of credit decision-making where two credit applicants were successful but a third credit applicant failed in obtaining credit. It is contended that the two successful applicants were powerful enough to approach a more powerful bank Chairperson and to obtain credit outside the normal credit rules with the support of accounting technology and using masks such as patriotism and social responsibility. The other applicant, who was initially accommodated with credit at the lower level, could not convince the credit decision-makers at the higher level with expensive professionally prepared accounting reports. This applicant was not from an influential social network and could not reach the powerful credit decision-makers informally was rejected through strict application of credit rules. Deep analysis of these facts supports the Marxian claim that credit and exploitation mechanisms work towards concentration of wealth and sustaining income inequality. Credit decisions supply money to influential individuals and it is argued that such economic power enhances the social powerbase of those individuals, which in turn reinforces the propensity to make preferential credit decisions, thereby making them richer. In contrast, a lack of money translates into powerlessness, deprivation and exclusion from social activities for the majority of the poor. In this process opportunities are lost to disadvantaged social groups and this necessarily results in poor people’s economic status remaining stagnant. These power-driven, discriminatory decision-making systems not only restrict the availability of financial capital for feasible projects, but also deny credit to potential enterprises. Further, wasting resources on unfeasible projects, while ignoring the need for nurturing potentially viable projects, are a double blow to efforts towards employment generation and economic development and therefore, are detrimental to the economic well-being of the general population. These findings provide insight for policy formulators for more productive financial capital mobility systems in Sri Lanka. It is suggested that suitable State intervention in regulating SME financing could remove such credit-related obstacles to economic development, and work towards a fair distribution of economic benefits to the people in Sri Lanka and beyond.

The purpose of this PhD thesis is to make a contribution to existing knowledge in the field of critical accounting by studying credit mechanisms and their link to income/wealth inequality in Sri Lankan society and the role of accounting technology in facilitating such mechanisms. The literature review revealed that: a) Global inequality is aggravated by the disparity of economic development which is possible only through state intervention; b) Unemployment is considered as a dilemma for economic development in developing countries by most politicians/administrators/researchers; c) In any country, around 60-70 percent of employment is generated by small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) and; d) Their major problem is access to credit. This research was designed to find out how the credit system works and why certain SMEs do not have adequate access to credit to develop their businesses; to provide employment; to increase the share of national income to the lower income groups; to narrow down the gap between the rich and poor within and between countries. A case study research approach was followed to extract data on real-life experiences of the research participants. Reliability of data was ensured by using various verification techniques and maximum efforts were made to balance the two extremes of validity of the research; internal and external. The extent of representation by the cases and the bank was tested, and judged as high, with 12-14 characteristics common to the Sri Lankan credit culture and banking industry respectively. Marxian critical theories were used for theoretical guidance throughout the research. The three case studies provide empirical evidence for the existence of the discriminatory nature of credit decision-making where two credit applicants were successful but a third credit applicant failed in obtaining credit. It is contended that the two successful applicants were powerful enough to approach a more powerful bank Chairperson and to obtain credit outside the normal credit rules with the support of accounting technology and using masks such as patriotism and social responsibility. The other applicant, who was initially accommodated with credit at the lower level, could not convince the credit decision-makers at the higher level with expensive professionally prepared accounting reports. This applicant was not from an influential social network and could not reach the powerful credit decision-makers informally was rejected through strict application of credit rules. Deep analysis of these facts supports the Marxian claim that credit and exploitation mechanisms work towards concentration of wealth and sustaining income inequality. Credit decisions supply money to influential individuals and it is argued that such economic power enhances the social powerbase of those individuals, which in turn reinforces the propensity to make preferential credit decisions, thereby making them richer. In contrast, a lack of money translates into powerlessness, deprivation and exclusion from social activities for the majority of the poor. In this process opportunities are lost to disadvantaged social groups and this necessarily results in poor people’s economic status remaining stagnant. These power-driven, discriminatory decision-making systems not only restrict the availability of financial capital for feasible projects, but also deny credit to potential enterprises. Further, wasting resources on unfeasible projects, while ignoring the need for nurturing potentially viable projects, are a double blow to efforts towards employment generation and economic development and therefore, are detrimental to the economic well-being of the general population. These findings provide insight for policy formulators for more productive financial capital mobility systems in Sri Lanka. It is suggested that suitable State intervention in regulating SME financing could remove such credit-related obstacles to economic development, and work towards a fair distribution of economic benefits to the people in Sri Lanka and beyond.

We examine the effects of monetary policy on income inequality in Japan using a novel econometric approach that jointly estimates the Gini coefficient based on micro-level grouped data of households and the dynamics of macroeconomic quantities. Our results indicate different effects on income inequality for different types of households: A monetary tightening increases inequality when income data is based on households whose head is employed (workers' households), while the effect reverses over the medium term when considering a broader definition of households. Differences in the relative strength of the transmission channels can account for this finding. Finally we demonstrate that the proposed joint estimation strategy leads to more informative inference while results based on the frequently used two-step estimation approach yields inconclusive results. / Series: Working Papers in Regional Science

People’s self-perception biases often lead them to see themselves as better than the average person (a phenomenon known as self-enhancement). This bias varies across cultures, and variations are typically explained using cultural variables, such as individualism versus collectivism. We propose that socioeconomic differences among societies—specifically, relative levels of economic inequality—play an important but unrecognized role in how people evaluate themselves. Evidence for selfenhancement was found in 15 diverse nations, but the magnitude of the bias varied. Greater self-enhancement was found in societies with more income inequality, and income inequality predicted cross-cultural differences in self-enhancement better than did individualism/collectivism. These results indicate that macrosocial differences in the distribution of economic goods are linked to microsocial processes of perceiving the self. / Steve Loughnan is a postdoctoral research associate funded by the Leverhulme Trust (F/00236/W). Peter Kuppens is a postdoctoral research fellow with the Fund for Scientific Research-Flanders and is supported by Katholieke Universiteit Leuven Research Council Grants GOA/05/04 and OT/11/031. Anu Realo and Jüri Allik were supported by a grant from the Estonian Ministry of Education and Science (SF0180029s08). Junqi Shi was supported by a grant from the National Nature Foundation of China (NSFC:71021001). / Revisión por pares

Cette thèse porte sur la mesure de l'inégalité d'opportunité et son effet sur la croissance économique. Le Chapitre 1 étudie les propriétés axiomatiques de deux approches de mesure concurrentes. Dans les deux cas, la population est partitionnée en groupes rassemblant des personnes partageant les mêmes circonstances, ces déterminants de revenu que les individus ne peuvent choisir (ex. sexe ou milieu familial). L'inégalité d'opportunité est alors mesurée comme celle présente au sein d'une distribution contrefactuelle où chacun se voit attribuer le revenu représentatif de son groupe. La première approche considère la moyenne arithmétique comme revenu représentatif. Lorsque le nombre de groupes est grand et que leur taille est petite, ces moyennes sont peu précisément estimées. Afin de d'atténuer ce problème, la seconde approche, dite paramétrique, suppose que les circonstances n'ont pas d'effet d'interaction et remplace la moyenne arithmétique par la prédiction OLS du revenu régressé sur les circonstances. Le Chapitre 1 montre que la méthode paramétrique est faible d'un point de vue axiomatique. En particulier, elle ne respecte pas une version «entre­-groupes» du principe des transferts. Le Chapitre 2 propose une méthodologie afin de contourner le manque actuel de micro-données sur les circonstances parentales, un déterminant majeur de l'inégalité d'opportunité. L'idée est d'utiliser 1 structure des enquêtes démographiques organisées autour de foyers afin de retrouver les circonstances parentales des adultes vivant avec leurs parents, puis d'utiliser une méthode d'ajustement statistique -l'imputation multiple -afin d'obtenir une mesure d'inégalité d'opportunité représentative de la population adulte dans son ensemble. Celle-ci est proche de la« vraie» inégalité d'opportunité, qui repose sur des questions directes à propos du milieu parental contenue dans l'enquête brésilienne du PNAD 1996. Le Chapitre 3 étudie empiriquement une récente explication quant au caractère peu concluant de la littérature empirique sur l'inégalité et la croissance: ce n'est pas l'inégalité de revenus qui compte pour la croissance mais ses deux composantes, à savoir l'inégalité d'opportunité et la composante résiduelle qu'est l'inégalité d'effort. Cette explication est validée au Brésil au niveau municipal durant la période 1980-2010, où le: inégalités d'opportunité et d'effort sont respectivement préjudiciables et bénéfiques à la croissance économique future, comme attendu. Leurs effets sont robustes et significatifs, contrairement à celui de l'inégalité total de revenus. / This thesis is about the measurement of inequality of opportunity and its impact on economic growth. Chapter 1 studies the axiomatic properties of two prominent measurement approaches. In both cases, the population is partitioned into groups of people sharing the same circumstances, those income determinants that are beyond individual control (e.g. sex or parental background) and that shape one's opportunities. Inequality of opportunity is then measured by applying a1 inequality index over a counterfactual distribution where each individual is attributed the representative income of his group. The first approach takes the representative income of a group to be its arithmetic mean. When a large number of small-sized groups are considered, these means can be poorly estimated. To mitigate this issue, the second approach, called parametric, assumes that circumstances have no interaction effect and takes this representative income to be the OLS predicted value of income regressed on circumstances. Chapter I shows that the parametric approach has poor axiomatic properties, especially with respect to a between-group version of the transfer principle. Chapter 2 provides a methodology to circumvent the current lack of microdata on parental background circumstances, a major driver of inequality of oppo1tunity. The idea is to retrieve the parental background of adults living with their parents thanks to the structure of household survey data, and then to apply a missing data procedure -multiple imputation -to obtain estimate of inequality of opportunity that are representative of the overall adult population. These estimates are shown to be close to their "true" counterpa1ts, based on direct questions about parental background contained in the Brazilian PNAD 1996 survey. Chapter 3 empirically investigates a recent and promising explanation for the inconclusiveness of traditional growth-inequality literature: income inequality does not matter for growth while its components -inequality of opportunity and the residual one, inequality of effort -do. This explanation is validated in Brazil at the municipality level over the period 1980-20 l 0, where inequalities of opportunity and effort are respectively detrimental and beneficial to subsequent growth, as expected. Their effects are robust and significant, in contrast to that of total income inequality.

Submitted by Guilherme Gugelmin Zimmermann (guilhermegz@gmail.com) on 2017-05-29T17:49:50Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertação_Guilherme_Zimmermann_Final.pdf: 586056 bytes, checksum: 37d9026e6e8fa295f23edb7ecbc9cf4d (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by GILSON ROCHA MIRANDA (gilson.miranda@fgv.br) on 2017-06-06T13:12:52Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertação_Guilherme_Zimmermann_Final.pdf: 586056 bytes, checksum: 37d9026e6e8fa295f23edb7ecbc9cf4d (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2017-06-21T17:45:31Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertação_Guilherme_Zimmermann_Final.pdf: 586056 bytes, checksum: 37d9026e6e8fa295f23edb7ecbc9cf4d (MD5) Previous issue date: 2017-03-31 / The low levels of human capital across most of the population within underdeveloped countries is believed to be a major obstacle for economic growth and development. This paper proposes an overlapping generations model, with fertility and education choices, to investigate the impact of public education on inequality and fertility across households of di erent levels of income. Testing the model calibrated with recent data from Brazil with di erent amounts and e ciency levels for public investment in education indicates that there is much to gain in terms of inequality reduction and income gains by improving quality of education than just spending more resources on it. / Acredita-se que baixos níveis de capital humano através da maior parte da população em países subdesenvolvidos seja um dos principais obstáculos para crescimento e desenvolvimento econômico. Este artigo propõe um modelo de gerações superpostas, com escolha de fertilidade e educação, para investigar o impacto da educação pública em desigualdade e fertilidade através de domicílios com diferentes níveis de renda. Testes com o modelo calibrado com dados recentes do Brasil, usando diferentes quantidades e níveis de eficiência para o investimento público em educação, indicam que há bastante a se ganhar aumentando a qualidade da educação do que somente gastando mais recursos.

Submitted by Isabela Freire (isabelafreire22@gmail.com) on 2018-01-09T17:24:44Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Educação e Desigualdade de Renda no Brasil - Isabela Freire de A. Pinto.pdf: 2009066 bytes, checksum: ca4538653546bbb7a4be3e1b7fcb5019 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by GILSON ROCHA MIRANDA (gilson.miranda@fgv.br) on 2018-01-15T18:38:52Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 Educação e Desigualdade de Renda no Brasil - Isabela Freire de A. Pinto.pdf: 2009066 bytes, checksum: ca4538653546bbb7a4be3e1b7fcb5019 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2018-01-16T12:29:07Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Educação e Desigualdade de Renda no Brasil - Isabela Freire de A. Pinto.pdf: 2009066 bytes, checksum: ca4538653546bbb7a4be3e1b7fcb5019 (MD5) / In this study, we seek to understand the degree in which education can affect income inequality in Brazil. We analyzed the Gini index at state level, taking into account the average years of schooling, educational inequality and percentage of enrollment in each educational stage. We developed the educational inequality index and we insert control variables as the minimum wage, informality and unemployment rate. We estimated four models in panel data: Fixed Effects, Random Effects, Weighted Least Squares and Cluster Estimator. The results show that education generates a significant impact on the income inequality. The enrollment in High School has a greater, and also statistically significant effect, on the income inequality in three models. Finally we conclude that education affects income inequality in Brazil and the increase of 1% of the population with complete secondary education, drops the Gini index by 0,003 p.p. / Neste estudo, buscamos entender em qual grau a educação pode afetar a desigualdade de renda no Brasil. Analisamos a nível estadual o índice de Gini, levando em consideração a média de anos de escolaridade, a desigualdade educacional e o percentual de ingressão em cada segmento de ensino em cada período. Desenvolvemos o índice de Gini Educacional para refletir a desigualdade educacional e controlamos as regressões para outras variáveis que também afetam a desigualdade como o salário mínimo, o grau de informalidade e a taxa de desemprego. Estimamos quatro modelos diferentes em dados de painel: Efeitos Fixos, Efeitos Aleatórios, Mínimos Quadrados Ponderados e Estimador Entre-Grupos. Os resultados obtidos demonstram que a educação possui impacto sobre a desigualdade de renda. A ingressão nos segmentos de ensino, especialmente o Ensino Médio possui um efeito maior e estatisticamente significativo na redução da desigualdade de renda, em três modelos. Por fim, concluímos que a educação afeta a desigualdade de renda no Brasil e o aumento de 1% da população com Ensino Médio completo, gera uma queda no índice de Gini de 0,003 p.p.

Inequality is a social phenomenon that exists across all nations; it is a condition which means that not everyone enjoys the same access to resources of all kinds and to certain positions that society values. Despite its importance, in Peru, the analysis of different approaches to inequality was not taken up until the 20th century, since it was only then that data began to be prepared to enable its study. Because detailed analyses of inequality did not exist before the 20th century, the objective of this study is to estimate income inequality in Peru at the end of the 19th century on the basis of the 1876 census, the first population and housing census of the Republican era. This census is considered to be particularly important for its utilization of modern techniques to enumerate the inhabitants of the day. / La desigualdad es un fenómeno social que existe en todas las naciones, es una condición que implica que las personas no gocen del mismo acceso a los recursos de todo tipo y a ciertas posiciones que valora la sociedad. A pesar de la importancia, en el Perú, estimaciones sobre diferentes enfoques de la desigualdad fueron abordados a partir del siglo XX debido a que desde aquella época recién se elaboran datos que hicieron posible su estudio. Dado que no existen estimaciones detalladas sobre la desigualdad antes del siglo XX, el objetivo de este estudio es estimar la desigualdad de ingresos en el Perú a finales del siglo XIX tomando como base al censo de 1876, primer censo de población y vivienda de la Época Republicana. Se le considera el más importante por ser el que contó con técnicas modernas para el empadronamiento de los habitantes de aquella época.

nÃo hà / O presente trabalho busca investigar eventual relaÃÃo entre o desenvolvimento financeiro e desigualdade de renda. Para tal, foram utilizados os dados dos 184 municÃpios cearenses, para o ano de 2010, firmando-se como medida de desigualdade o Ãndice de Gini e, como variÃveis explicativas, as razÃes estabelecidas entre crÃdito e PIB, entre operaÃÃes de crÃdito e PIB; entre operaÃÃes de crÃdito e populaÃÃo; entre financiamentos e PIB e, por fim, entre financiamentos e populaÃÃo, como proxies para o desenvolvimento financeiro. Foi utilizado o mÃtodo denominado Jackknife Model Averaging, que se caracteriza por ser um procedimento de estimaÃÃo que leva em consideraÃÃo todas as possÃveis especificaÃÃes de modelo com base em um conjunto de variÃveis. Empregou-se, ainda, a abordagem FMA, sugerida em Hansen e Racine (2012). Os resultados obtidos indicam que o desenvolvimento financeiro nÃo à estatisticamente relevante para interferir na reduÃÃo da desigualdade de renda. / This work seeks to investigate an eventual relationship between financial development and income inequality. For this, was used data from 184 cities from CearÃ, at the year of 2010, Using as a measure of inequality, the Gini index and, as explanatory variables, the reasons established between credit and GDP, between credit and GDP operations; between credit and population operations; between financing and GDP and, finally, between funding and population, as proxies for financial development. Was used the method called Jackknife Model Averaging, which is characterized by being a procedure of estimation that takes into account all possible model specifications based on a set of variables. We used also the FMA approach suggested in Hansen and Racine (2012). The results indicate that financial development is not statistically relevant to interfere in reducing income inequality.

Minas Gerais é um dos estados que mais se destaca pelas disparidades regionais. Coexistem no estado regiões dinâmicas e modernas em contraste com regiões atrasadas e estagnadas. Neste contexto, o objetivo deste trabalho foi de analisar a distribuição de renda e pobreza em Minas Gerais, destacando as desigualdades regionais do estado, considerando a divisão do estado em 12 mesorregiões. Cada mesorregião apresenta um nível de desenvolvimento medido pelo Índice de Desenvolvimento Humano Municipal (IDH-M). Para a análise foram usadas medidas de desigualdade, medidas de posição e modelos de regressão múltipla. A principal base de dados utilizada é o Censo Demográfico de 2000 do Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia e Estatística. Para o cumprimento dos objetivos, foram analisados dois tipos de distribuição: do rendimento domiciliar per capita e das pessoas ocupadas com rendimento. Verificou-se que a desigualdade da distribuição da renda domiciliar per capita tende a ser menor nas mesorregiões mais desenvolvidas do que nas mesorregiões menos desenvolvidas. O rendimento domiciliar per capita foi dividido em 7componentes: rendimento do trabalho principal; rendimento demais trabalhos; aposentadorias e pensões; aluguéis; pensão alimentícia, mesada, doação; renda mínima, bolsa escola, seguro desemprego e outros rendimentos. Dessas 7 parcelas, 3 delas (rendimento trabalho principal, aposentadorias e pensões e renda mínima/bolsa escola e seguro desemprego) contribuem para diminuir a desigualdade, enquanto as 4 restantes (demais trabalhos, aluguéis, pensão alimentícia/mesada/doação e outros rendimentos) contribuem para aumentar a desigualdade. Na análise regional, constatou-se que as razões de concentração do rendimento do trabalho principal e dos aluguéis estão negativamente correlacionados com o nível de desenvolvimento das mesorregiões, medido pelo IDH-M. Por outro lado, as razões de concentração do rendimento dos demais trabalhos e de outros rendimentos estão positivamente correlacionados com o nível de desenvolvimento regional. Na mensuração da pobreza observou-se que as mesorregiões Jequitinhonha, Vale do Mucuri e Norte de Minas estão em situação crítica de pobreza, sendo que mais da metade da população é considerada pobre. O número de pessoas pobres atendidas pelos programas de renda mínima, bolsa escola e seguro desemprego nessas mesorregiões é ainda pequeno, sugerindo a expansão desses benefícios. Analisando a distribuição do rendimento das pessoas ocupadas, observou-se que a educação se destaca como o principal condicionante da desigualdade entre elas. Também foi destacado que a taxa de retorno da educação não é constante para todos os níveis de escolaridade. Notou-se que, além da taxa de retorno da educação ter acréscimos maiores com a obtenção de um diploma, há um nítido aumento nessa taxa a partir dos 10 anos, devido ao “threshold effect”. Observou-se que a taxa de retorno da educação está relacionada com a participação do setor de serviços nas mesorregiões, mas não se constatou a existência de uma relação monotônica entre essa taxa e o nível de desenvolvimento das mesorregiões. / Minas Gerais is one of the states that shows large differences among regions. On the one hand, there are dinamic and modern regions; on the other hand, backward and stagnated ones. In this context, the aim of this study was to analyze income distribution and povety in Minas Gerais, focusing on the regional inequalities in the state, dividing the state into 12 regions. The level of development of each region was measured by the Municipal Human Development Index. To carry out the analysis, measures of inequality, measures of position and multiple regression models were used. The main database used is the Demographic Census of 2000 from the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics. Two types of income were considered: per capita household income and earnings of employed workers. It was noticed that the inequality of the per capita household income distribution tends to be smaller in more developed regions than in the less developed ones. The household income was divided into 7 components: earnings from the main job; earnings from other jobs; pensions; rents; alimony and donations; government income transfers and other incomes. Out of these 7 components, three of them ( earnings from the main job, pensions and government income transfer) contribute to reduce inequality, while the other 4 (earnings from other jobs, rents, alimony/donations and other incomes) contribute to increase inequality. In the regional analysis, it was observed that the concentration ratios of earnings from the main job and rents are negatively related to the level of development of the regions, measured by IDH-M. On the other hand, concentration ratios of earnings from other jobs and from other incomes are positively related to the level of regional development. In measuring poverty, it was noticed that the regions of Jequitinhonha, Vale do Mucuri and North of Minas Gerais are in a critical condition of poverty, with the majority of the population considered poor. The number of poor people assisted by the government income transfers programs in these regions is still too small, suggesting the expansion of such benefits. Analysing income distribution of employed people, it was observed that education is as the main determinant inequality. It was also highlighted that the education return rate is not constant for all levels of education. It was observed that, besides being higher at levels that correspond to a diploma, the education return rate shows an expressive increase from 10 years on, due to a “threshold effect”. It was noticed that the education return rate is related to the participation of the service sector in the regions, but the dada did not show the existence of a monotonic relation between this rate and the level of development of the regions.