Book chapters
Regional Disparities and Urban Segregation
with Julian Messina. Chapter 4 in Busso and Messina (eds.), “The Inequality Crisis: Latin America and the Caribbean at the Crossroads”, IADB, 2020.
Book available in English and Spanish
All countries, developed or underdeveloped, have rich and poor regions. And both types of regions have cities and rural settlements that are themselves characterized by stark differences in income and access to services. Within cities one can observe substantial variations in income, wages, access, and quality of services across neighborhoods and households. This chapter provides a snapshot of the geography of inequality, highlighting subnational differences in Latin American countries. The chapter first characterizes income and wage gaps across major regions of eleven Latin American countries. Average earnings in the country’s richest region can be up to three times higher than in the poorest. A decomposition analysis shows, however, that regional disparities account for only 4 percent of the overall wage inequality in this group of countries, compared with almost 10 percent stemming from cross-country disparities. Most of the wage inequality is explained by intraregional differences. The chapter then looks at spatial inequality at smaller geographic scales, focusing on the region’s largest country. In Brazil, less than 1 percent of total wage inequality is explained by differences among large regions and states, and an additional 2 percent by differences across cities. By way of contrast, differences across neighborhoods account for 9 percent. To shed light on these results, the latter part of this chapter explores recent academic research on possible causes, consequences, and alternative policy responses to spatial inequality within cities.
The Spatial Dimension of Inequality
with Julian Messina. Chapter 4 in Nuguer and Powell (eds.), “Inclusion in Times of Covid-19”, IADB, 2020.
Book available in English and Spanish
The COVID-19 pandemic is having devastating consequences for the livelihoods of Latin Americans, in particular among the poor and vulnerable. The focus of this report is on how to boost inclusive growth—growth that at the same time reduces inequality. While this is always important, the current crisis has brought this agenda to the forefront. But inequality comes in many dimensions: in incomes, in wealth, in access to education and to other services. But less is known about inequality across regions within countries. And yet this is critical to be able to craft effective policies to boost inclusive growth. If inequality across regions is unimportant, then policies to further equality likely should be nationally planned and administrated. If inequality has a regional dimension, then specific policies to assist poorer areas should be part of the policy mix and subregional authorities should likely develop specific policies for their own territories. This chapter discusses the measurement of regional inequality, whether regional inequality in Latin America and the Caribbean is exceptional, whether poorer regions are converging, and how regional inequality contributes to overall inequality.
Book
Conflict and Local Government: The Case of Urban Transportation in Quito
Book available in Spanish only. Original Title: “Conflicto y Gobierno Local: El Caso del Transport Urbano en Quito”. EdicionesAbyaYala y Flacso, Sede Ecuador, 2007.
The COVID-19 pandemic is having devastating consequences for the livelihoods of Latin Americans, in particular among the poor and vulnerable. The focus of this report is on how to boost inclusive growth—growth that at the same time reduces inequality. While this is always important, the current crisis has brought this agenda to the forefront. But inequality comes in many dimensions: in incomes, in wealth, in access to education and to other services. But less is known about inequality across regions within countries. And yet this is critical to be able to craft effective policies to boost inclusive growth. If inequality across regions is unimportant, then policies to further equality likely should be nationally planned and administrated. If inequality has a regional dimension, then specific policies to assist poorer areas should be part of the policy mix and subregional authorities should likely develop specific policies for their own territories. This chapter discusses the measurement of regional inequality, whether regional inequality in Latin America and the Caribbean is exceptional, whether poorer regions are converging, and how regional inequality contributes to overall inequality.
