Sanjoy Chakravorty, S. Chandrasekhar, Karthikeya Naraparaju (p)

Titissari Titissari

This paper is a contribution to understanding income generation and inequality in India’s agricultural sector. We analyze the National Sample Surveys of agriculture in 2003 and 2013 using descriptive, decomposition, and modeling tools, and estimate income inequality in the agricultural sector at the scale of the nation and its 17 largest states. We show that: (a) income inequality in India’s agricultural sector is very high (Gini Coefficient of around 0.6 during the period), (b) about half of the income inequality is explained by the household-level variance in income from cultivation, which in turn is primarily dependent on variance in landownership, and (c) there are significant state-level differences in the structures/patterns of income generation from agriculture.

Omoniyi Alimi (p), David Maré, Jacques Poot

Karthikeya Naraparaju

As is the case in most developed countries, the population of New Zealand is ageing numerically and structurally. Population ageing can have important effects on the distribution of personal income within and between urban areas. The age structure of the population may affect the distribution of income through the life-cycle profile of earnings but also through the spatial-temporal distribution of income within the various age groups. By decomposing New Zealand census data from 1986 to 2013 by age and urban area, this chapter examines the effects of population ageing on spatial-temporal changes in the distribution of personal income to better understand urban area-level income inequality (measured by the Mean Log Deviation index). We focus explicitly on differences between metropolitan and non-metropolitan urban areas. New Zealand has experienced a significant increase in income inequality over the last few decades, but population ageing has slightly dampened this trend. Because metropolitan areas are ageing slower, the inequality-reducing effect of ageing has been less in these areas. However, this urban-size differential-ageing effect on inequality growth has been relatively small compared with the faster growth in intra-age group inequality in the metropolitan areas.

Titissari Titissari (p), Philip McCann, Niels Hermes, Viktor Venhorst

Omoniyi Alimi

There is a growing literature on financial inclusion, which is often linked to the set of policies enabling individuals and businesses to have access to financial services sustainably to achieve economic welfare. However, these literature has paid very little, if any, attention to the importance of geographical and institutional setting in the context of access and use of financial services. We explore and measure the financial inclusion for an individual from the use of financial services by a bank, another Alternative Financial Providers (AFPs), and community social capital. And the access to financial services is set to be the explanatory variable determining financial inclusion.
The purposes of this paper are twofold. First, this study presents a micro-level investigation that provides closer linkages between individual’s financial decision, wider social-economic structure, and the geographical and institutional environment in financial inclusion study. Second, we aim to examine the extent to which intersection between spatial and institutional dimension determining individuals saving decision. Specifically, we hypothesized a multilevel logistic model to examine whether the interaction between urban and institutional setting of both formal and informal financial service provider can provide people a better access for saving facilities. The study draws on the experience of Indonesia to address these issues. Indonesia is an interesting case because it displays both enormous geographical heterogeneity as an archipelagic country with very vast population and institutional setting.
To this end, the paper found that the urban geographical setting, the presence of highly institutionalized bank market, and the emergence of social capital represented by ROSCA participation in the community significantly increase the individual’s likelihood of having saving.