Course 2015-2016 a.y.

30195 - ECONOMICS (POVERTY, INEQUALITY AND INCOME DISTRIBUTION)


CLEAM - CLEF - CLEACC - BESS-CLES - BIEMF

Department of Social and Political Sciences

Course taught in English

Go to class group/s: 31
CLEAM (6 credits - I sem. - OP  |  SECS-P/01) - CLEF (6 credits - I sem. - OP  |  SECS-P/01) - CLEACC (6 credits - I sem. - OP  |  SECS-P/01) - BESS-CLES (6 credits - I sem. - OP  |  SECS-P/01) - BIEMF (6 credits - I sem. - OP  |  SECS-P/01)
Course Director:
PAOLO PINOTTI

Classes: 31 (I sem.)
Instructors:
Class 31: PAOLO PINOTTI



Course Objectives

The course addresses the main approaches to the measurement of inequality and poverty, their main trends at the global level, and their fundamental determinants. For each topic we will discuss the relevant theoretical framework, the main measurement issues, and the available empirical evidence. This course is particularly targeted to economics students who plan to enroll in a Master or Ph.D. program, but students from all degrees and backgrounds are very welcome to attend.


Course Content Summary

  • Why this course?
    • Inequality, the financial crisis, and the great recession.
    • Global trends in inequality and poverty.
    • Measurement: The need for criteria.
  • Introduction to the measurement of inequality and poverty:
    • Income distribution functions: Pareto, Normal and Log-normal.
    • Partial ordering methods: Stochastic dominance and the Lorenz Curve.
    • Complete ordering methods: the Gini index.
    • The transfer principle and other criteria for evaluating inequality measures.
  • Trends in income shares:
    • The top 1%: Capital in the XXI century.
    • The remaining 99%: Skill-biased technical change, education, and globalization.
    • Measurement: the Pareto distribution and the estimation of income shares.
  • Intergenerational inequality:
    • Where is the "Land of Opportunity"? The Great Gatsby curve.
    • The generation gap.
    • Measurement intergenerational income elasticity, rank-rank regressions.
  • The World Income Distribution:
    • The Solow model,growth accounting and the convergence debate.
    • Between-and Within-country inequality.
    • Measurement entropy measures,the inequality possibility frontier and the extration ratio.
  • Policy analysis:
    • Optimal taxation and foreign aid.
    • Randomized controlled trials.
    • Measurement the Atkinson index, poverty measures.

Detailed Description of Assessment Methods

The assessment is written.


Textbooks

A course pack and a series of articles will be distribuited in the classroom.
Exam textbooks & Online Articles (check availability at the Library)

Prerequisites

No specific prerequisites are required but basic knowledge of microeconomics, macroeconomic and statistics.

Last change 06/05/2015 14:11