Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/322166 
Authors: 
Year of Publication: 
2025
Series/Report no.: 
WIDER Working Paper No. 41/25
Publisher: 
The United Nations University World Institute for Development Economics Research (UNU-WIDER), Helsinki
Abstract: 
Kuznets predicts an economy's return to low inequality once structural transformation has peaked. I explore some headwinds to falling inequality in developing countries given their thorough engagement in the globalized market Kuznets could not have foreseen. Headwinds include plutocrats' abuse of open capital markets to elude taxation, populism in rich countries that prevents migration of labour from less to more productive economies, and climate damage. On structural transformation, growth and urbanization in some countries, though less dramatic than for the first industrializers, indicates it is occurring. But in countries including India and Nigeria, the services-based transformation today's global market now requires depends on a dramatic upgrade in the quality of basic education.
Subjects: 
inequality
globalization
plutocrats
populism
structural transformation
Persistent Identifier of the first edition: 
ISBN: 
978-92-9256-600-5
Document Type: 
Working Paper

Files in This Item:
File
Size





Items in EconStor are protected by copyright, with all rights reserved, unless otherwise indicated.