While the long run productivity of federal highway infrastructure spending has been well researched, their short run effects and effects on income inequality. This dissertation explores those under-researched unconventional effects. In the first chapter, I investigate the effects of federal infrastructure grants on income inequality. I find that grants reduce inequality in both recipient and neighboring states. The reduction is driven by greater income among the bottom three income quintiles. I explore two mechanisms using person level data and find that the reduction in inequality is attributable to higher income for low-skilled workers and workers working in low-skilled industries. In the second chapter, I investigate the role of implementation lags in the ARRA. I find that the employment effects after six months were nearly twice as high in short lag counties compared to long lag counties. However, these effects quickly fade. I find no evidence of implementation lags impacting employment after one year. In the third chapter, I examine the effect of the business cycle on completion times of federally financed transportation infrastructure projects. I find that projects that begin construction during periods of economic slack are completed more quickly, suggesting an alternative mechanism for state dependent fiscal multipliers.

This study analyses income inequality and poverty in the rural and urban sectors in Iran during the post Islamic revolution period, 1983-1993. It has been based on household level data relating to the Household Income and Expenditure Surveys conducted by the Statistical Centre of Iran for 1983, 1988 and 1993. The study starts with a brief review of the main features of the Iranian economy. This is followed by a brief discussion of the data. An analysis of temporal changes in income distribution and welfare, the contributions of factor income components on per capita income inequality, a detailed analysis of absolute poverty, earnings behaviour of full time urban male workers. The final chapter summarises and brings together the main conclusions. By and large, the finding of this study are quite rich and provide a very clean picture in the levels of income inequality, welfare and absolute poverty. Most of the changes in income inequality and poverty observed in this study seem to be, to some extent, the reflections, if not the outcomes, of government policies, strategies and war related activities and shortages etc. Based on the Iranian experience, we can say that political stability, accompanied by consistent and sustainable macroeconomic policies can ensure a reduction in income inequality and absolute poverty in a developing country. / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

<p>This study aim at investigating whether income inequality ceteris paribus is a determinant of population health measured by infant mortality rate and average expected lifetime. Earlier research has found results pointing in different directions but the income inequality hypothesis suggests that income inequality alone is something bad for the population. The study uses data on income distribution from the Luxembourg Income Study (LIS) and the World Income Inequality Database (WIID). Data on economic development and health indicators comes from the OECD database. An econometric model which applies country fixed effects is specified and the results indicates no effect from income inequality on infant mortality rate but some indications of a negative effect on average expected lifetime.</p>

This study analyzes the relationship between financial development and income inequality by using panel data of 60 developing and developed countries for the period 2000-2010. We find evidence for the linear negative relationship between financial development and income inequality which asserts that financial development reduces income inequality. We also find evidence supporting Kuznets inverted u-shaped hypothesis on development-income inequality link, except that for the developed countries where we find evidence for u-shaped hypothesis. It is also concluded that the panel is stationary without unit root, indicating that shocks on income inequality is not persistent.

This study aim at investigating whether income inequality ceteris paribus is a determinant of population health measured by infant mortality rate and average expected lifetime. Earlier research has found results pointing in different directions but the income inequality hypothesis suggests that income inequality alone is something bad for the population. The study uses data on income distribution from the Luxembourg Income Study (LIS) and the World Income Inequality Database (WIID). Data on economic development and health indicators comes from the OECD database. An econometric model which applies country fixed effects is specified and the results indicates no effect from income inequality on infant mortality rate but some indications of a negative effect on average expected lifetime.

This study identifies the extent to which neighbourhood socioeconomic trends are related to intentional and unintentional child injuries in Toronto, Ontario. Children living in lower socioeconomic status (SES) neighbourhoods have often been found to face a higher injury death and morbidity rate than more well‐off children. A likely explanation is an increase in the unequal exposure to injury-promoting environments on the basis of the income polarization (a declining middle income group). However, the strength of the inverse relationship between SES and injury is related to a number of factors, including the SES indicator chosen by the researcher. Hence, a goal of the study is to determine whether neighbourhood socioeconomic trends toward income polarization have predictive power in explaining variation in injury rates in young children aged 0-6, over and above more typical measures of SES and neighbourhood disadvantage. Census data were used to determine socioeconomic trends. Neighbourhoods (census tracts) were divided into three distinct categories based on neighbourhood change in average individual income: neighbourhoods that have been improving, declining, and those displaying mixed trends. This analysis of neighbourhoods was merged with geo-coded hospital-based emergency department data to calculate rates of overall injuries, falls, burns and poisoning. The predictive power of neighbourhood socioeconomic trends on injury was compared to more typical neighbourhood disadvantage measures such as income (high, medium, low), neighbourhood employment rates, education levels, and housing quality from the 2006 census. Socioeconomic trends contributed significantly to injury outcomes, but the contribution of other neighbourhood disadvantage indicators was higher. Housing in need of repair and individuals with no university degree in a neighbourhood were positively correlated with three of four outcomes. A high immigrant population in a neighbourhood was negatively correlated with three of four outcomes. Neighbourhood socioeconomic trends had slightly more predictive power than the more typical measure of SES (high, medium or low income). Researchers should carefully consider their socioeconomic status measures when predicting injury outcomes.

This dissertation comprises two essays that attempt to determine, empirically, the relationship between personal income taxation and income inequality. The first essay examines whether income inequality is affected by the structural progressivity of national income tax systems. Using detailed personal income tax schedules for a large panel of countries, we develop and estimate comprehensive, time-varying measures of structural progressivity of national income tax systems over the 1981–2005 period. Our findings suggest that progressivity has a strong negative effect on inequality in reported gross and net income and that this negative effect is strongest in countries whose institutional framework supports pro-poor redistribution. However, the effect of progressivity on true inequality, which is approximated by consumption-based measures of the GINI coefficient, is significantly smaller. The second essay relies on household level data and complements the first in its empirical approach. We simulate the distributional impact of the Russian personal income tax (PIT) following the flat tax reform of 2001 using data from the Russian Longitudinal Monitoring Survey. We use a series of counterfactuals to decompose the change in the distribution of net income into a direct (tax) effect and an indirect behavioral effect. As expected, the direct tax effect increased net income inequality. Changes in the pre-tax distribution, on the other hand, had a large negative impact on inequality thus leading to an overall decline in net income inequality. We also find that the tax-induced evasion response increased reported net income inequality while reducing consumption based measures of net income inequality.

This study identifies the extent to which neighbourhood socioeconomic trends are related to intentional and unintentional child injuries in Toronto, Ontario. Children living in lower socioeconomic status (SES) neighbourhoods have often been found to face a higher injury death and morbidity rate than more well‐off children. A likely explanation is an increase in the unequal exposure to injury-promoting environments on the basis of the income polarization (a declining middle income group). However, the strength of the inverse relationship between SES and injury is related to a number of factors, including the SES indicator chosen by the researcher. Hence, a goal of the study is to determine whether neighbourhood socioeconomic trends toward income polarization have predictive power in explaining variation in injury rates in young children aged 0-6, over and above more typical measures of SES and neighbourhood disadvantage. Census data were used to determine socioeconomic trends. Neighbourhoods (census tracts) were divided into three distinct categories based on neighbourhood change in average individual income: neighbourhoods that have been improving, declining, and those displaying mixed trends. This analysis of neighbourhoods was merged with geo-coded hospital-based emergency department data to calculate rates of overall injuries, falls, burns and poisoning. The predictive power of neighbourhood socioeconomic trends on injury was compared to more typical neighbourhood disadvantage measures such as income (high, medium, low), neighbourhood employment rates, education levels, and housing quality from the 2006 census. Socioeconomic trends contributed significantly to injury outcomes, but the contribution of other neighbourhood disadvantage indicators was higher. Housing in need of repair and individuals with no university degree in a neighbourhood were positively correlated with three of four outcomes. A high immigrant population in a neighbourhood was negatively correlated with three of four outcomes. Neighbourhood socioeconomic trends had slightly more predictive power than the more typical measure of SES (high, medium or low income). Researchers should carefully consider their socioeconomic status measures when predicting injury outcomes.

The purpose of this paper is to study China’s income inequality under rapid economic growth.Does the relationship between economic growth and income inequality in China follow theKuznets hypothesis? What is the main cause and trend of China’s income inequality? We usedata which covers the period 1980-2005 to analyze the overall inequality, and data coveringthe period 1980-2002 to analyze the inequality inside rural and urban areas. The derivedresults doubt the validity of Kuznets hypothesis on explaining the relationship betweeneconomic growth and income inequality in China. Also we derive the trend of China’sincreased income inequality and find that the urban-rural income disparity is the main causeof China’s income inequality.

Income inequality has been on the rise in many industrialised countries since around the 1980’s. In Sweden the increase of income inequality has been particularly large. This in spite of Sweden’s extensive redistribution system and public policy that prioritize equality among its population. This paper investigates a potential factor for the rise in inequality that is yet fairly unexplored, namely immigration. As inequality has increased in Sweden, so has also immigration. Sweden experienced large refugee inflows after the 1970’s, the largest flow consisting of circa 100 000 Yugoslavs during the Bosnian war. This study provides indications on what way immigration shapes the income distribution and lays the ground for prospective studies. Results show that the inflow of new migrants during the early 1990’s in Sweden raises income inequality and it is almost entirely due to increased dispersion in the lower tail of the income distribution.