The International Structure of Income: Its Implications for Economic Growth

Description

Global patterns of economic development have hardly changed over the past fifty years. All of the countries that were rich then are still rich now, and nearly all of the countries that were poor then are still poor now. This volume such patterns in the international structure of income over five decades. The few examples of upward mobility in the world-economy are examined in detail, with a special section devoted to the recent rise of China. Statistical estimates and graphs of global income inequality at both the national and individual levels of analysis are included. A key innovation of this volume is the formulation of hybrid models of economic growth combining elements from world- systems theory in sociology and neoclassical growth theory in economics. These models show that while investment is correlated with growth in the core of the world-economy, demographic effects predominate in the peripheries. Moreover, investment, particularly foreign direct investment, is shown to follow rather than cause economic growth. The overall message is that growth and development are largely driven not by economic policy, but by social policy.