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Language
English (en)
Date of Award
2017
Author's Department
International and Area Studies
Degree Name
Bachelor of Arts (A.B.)
Restricted/Unrestricted
Restricted
Abstract
A festering blight on our society to some, an unavoidable consequence of globalization and economic growth to others, the issue of income inequality inhabits both policy and normative discussions alike. And while this is a topic worthy of voluminous analysis, this paper will attempt to (as specifically as is possible) deconstruct the fiscal measures that interact with inequality and analyze how they might be reoriented so as to mitigate the trend of income inequality growth in the developed world. First, the discussion that follows will focus only on the “developed world” (defined by OECD countries), as global considerations do not contain such clearly determined trends’. Thus, while income inequality is still a large problem in the developing world (in many ways more so), it is too structurally intertwined in the development process to fit into a discussion on the effects of specific fiscal policies. Generally, this paper will analyze how the 35 developed, democratic, market economies of the OECD have responded to the growth in inequality over the past 30-40 years in terms of their taxation and redistribution policies (other non-fiscal responses, while undoubtedly important, would extent the discussion past the already broad purview of this paper). While concentrating the discussion on just these 35 nations may seem limiting as far as applicability of results, there is, in fact, considerable variation amongst them both in terms of fiscal response to rising inequality and the relative efficacy of their various strategies.
DOI
https://doi.org/10.7936/eqp1-yd09
Mentor
Andrew Sobel
Recommended Citation
Bublitz, Mark, "OECD Income Inequality Growth and Redistributive Fiscal Policies" (2017). Senior Honors Papers / Undergraduate Theses. 182.
The definitive version is available at https://doi.org/10.7936/eqp1-yd09
Comments
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