Income distribution, socioeconomic status, and self rated health in the United States: multilevel analysis

Objective: To determine the effect of inequalities in income within a state on self rated health status while controlling for individual characteristics such as socioeconomic status.

The Pursuit of Balanced Income An Economic Perspective on Wealth

The purpose of this thesis is to determine if households with moderate incomes have the opportunity to acquire pecuniary wealth. In an environment of increasing globalization, labor-eliminating technology, and an overburdened entitlement system, the position of wealth is necessary for households with a penchant for early retirement and particularly for those that will inevitably succumb to involuntary retirement. In these writings, qualitative and quantitative descriptions of wealth are offered; two microeconomic metrics are introduced to identify baseline wealth and to gauge proximity to this value; and strategies are devised to close the gap between these metrics. The construct of the economic intertemporal household budget was used as the basis for this research whereby conventional measures of wealth, i.e. net worth and liquid net worth, have been coupled with historical and empirical household data to define and extrapolate wealth and wealth proximity metrics. The major finding is wealth is a dynamic variable contingent upon consumption level rather than income or saving levels. And because households exercise a greater degree of autonomy over consumption, moderate earners are afforded the same opportunities as high earners. The position of wealth is necessary because it sustains consumption in the event of an unwelcomed retirement and it can assuage reliance on entitlement programs. For the majority of households, wealth is a matter of choice.

Consumer Driven Health Care: An Examination of the Disadvantages to Low Income Employees

As health care costs for companies continue to rise, more organizations are considering a consumer driven health plan option with the goal to engage employees so that they make better health care decisions. Although consumer driven health plan options present advantages to the employer and some employee groups, low income employees are negatively impacted by this option. Two major disadvantages include missed care and out of pocket obligations. This capstone reviews the current literature on consumer driven health care and discusses the disadvantages to low income employees. It also provides strategies and recommendations to employers who are considering a consumer driven health option plan to minimize the disadvantages to low income employees.

Income taxation of emigrants and immigrants under Spanish law

Análisis de las consecuencias tributarias de los cambios de residencia de las personas físicas.

Intimate partner violence among women in Spain: the impact of regional-level male unemployment and income inequality

Background: Intimate partner violence (IPV) against women is a complex worldwide public health problem. There is scarce research on the independent effect on IPV exerted by structural factors such as labour and economic policies, economic inequalities and gender inequality. Objective: To analyse the association, in Spain, between contextual variables of regional unemployment and income inequality and individual women’s likelihood of IPV, independently of the women’s characteristics. Method: We conducted multilevel logistic regression to analyse cross-sectional data from the 2011 Spanish Macrosurvey of Gender-based Violence which included 7898 adult women. The first level of analyses was the individual women’ characteristics and the second level was the region of residence. Results: Of the survey participants, 12.2% reported lifetime IPV. The region of residence accounted for 3.5% of the total variability in IPV prevalence. We determined a direct association between regional male long-term unemployment and IPV likelihood (P = 0.007) and between the Gini Index for the regional income inequality and IPV likelihood (P < 0.001). Women residing in a region with higher gender-based income discrimination are at a lower likelihood of IPV than those residing in a region with low gender-based income discrimination (odds ratio = 0.64, 95% confidence intervals: 0.55–0.75). Conclusions: Growing regional unemployment rates and income inequalities increase women’s likelihood of IPV. In times of economic downturn, like the current one in Spain, this association may translate into an increase in women’s vulnerability to IPV.

Will income inequality cause a middle-income trap in Asia? Bruegel Working Paper 2013/06, 10 October 2013

The Asian economy is expected to realise favourable growth during the first half of this century, but there is no guarantee. There is a discussion about a ‘middle-income trap’, which refers to a country that has realised rapid growth to become a middle-income country but is unable to grow further. A middle-income trap could occur not only if there is a delay in shifting the economy toward a productivity-driven structure, but also if there is a worsening of income distribution.We consider this in line with the theories of development economics and through a quantitative analysis. The relationship between income inequality and the trap can be explained by the Kuznets hypothesis and the basic-needs approach. Our quantitative analysis supports the Kuznets hypothesis, and indicates that,although a low-income country can accelerate its economic growth with the worsening of income distribution as an engine, a middle income country would experience a decreasing growth rate if it fails to narrow the income gap between the top and bottom income groups. The results also show that the basic-needs approach is also applicable in practice, and imply that the improvement of access to secondary education is important. A sensitivity analysis for three Asian upper-middle-income countries(China, Malaysia and Thailand) also shows that the situation related to a middle-income trap is worse than average in China and Malaysia. These two countries, according to the result of the sensitivity analysis, should urgently improve access to secondary education and should implement income redistribution measures to develop high-tech industries, before their demographic dividends expire. Income redistribution includes the narrowing of rural urban income disparities, benefits to low-income individuals, direct income transfers, vouchers or free provision of education and health-care, and so on, but none of these are simple to implement.

An inexhaustible source of income? The significance of Belarusian refineries and the outlook for the future. OSW Commentary No. 81, 2012-06-20

Belarus generated a surplus at US$1.9 billion in foreign trade in goods and services in the first four months of 2012 as compared to a deficit of US$2.8 billion for the same timeframe a year earlier. Minsk owes this, its highest positive trade balance since 1991, mainly to a significant increase in exports of petroleum products manufactured by the refineries in Navapolatsk and Mazyr. This is a consequence of the favourable contract for supplies of Russian oil until 2015 which Belarus signed in December last year. This contract has resulted in a de facto resumption of Russia subsidising Belarus. The favourable conditions of Russian oil supplies will allow the Belarusian refineries to remain the driving force of the country’s economy, and the Belarusian government will not allow them to be privatised, which Russia has been seeking for years. The two refineries initiated an ambitious modernisation programme, which is aimed at increasing their output and improving the quality of their production. Owing to this, their share in the market of petroleum products in the region, including on the Polish market, may grow within the next few years.

Income Distributional Effects of Decoupled Payments Single Payment Scheme in the European Union. Factor Markets Working Paper No. 29, July 2012

This paper analyses the effects of the Single Payment Scheme (SPS) with and without farm structural change, and focuses on how income distributional effects and farm restructuring are impacted by the SPS under: alternative entitlement tradability, cross-compliance and CAP 'greening' requirements, different SPS implementation models, the entitlement stock, market imperfections and institutional regulations. The authors find that the SPS implication details are highly significant, since farmers’ benefits can range from 100% of the SPS value to a negative policy incidence, and farm structural change may also be hindered by the SPS.