Re: On Ginis and 1947-1998 US Ginis

As a commentary on the recent post by Professor Chavez (see below) -- I find
three items contained in the article remarkable from a WS point of view,
namely:

(a) the conceptual distinction between intra-national, international and
world-level inequality (all three being distinct from each other);

(b) the quantification of world-level inequality (given in two forms, PPP
and not PPP valuation), namely:
"Milanovic finds that
the world Gini coefficient increased from 63 in 1988 to 66 in 1993. If
purchasing power differences are not taken into account, that is, if we
simply look at differences in dollar incomes, the Gini increased from 78 to
80."

(c) the empirical finding that "openness" (i.e. neoliberal free-trade
policies) hurt 40% of world population and benefit 60%, namely:
"Lundberg and Squire** find that greater openness to
trade is correlated negatively with income growth among the poorest 40
percent of the population, but strongly and positively with income growth
among remaining groups, in a sample of 38 countries between 1965 and 1992
The costs of adjusting to greater openness are borne exclusively by the
poor"

This is excellent empirical support for the claim that the theory (doctrine,
ideology) of "comparative advantage" has a massive class bias -- advantage
for the upper 60%, disadvantage for the lower 40% of world population. With
a world population of 6 billion, that means that 2.4 billion people are the
losers in neoclassical/neoliberal paradise.

Gert Kohler


-----Original Message-----
From: Emilio José Chaves <chavesej@hotmail.com>
To: WORLD SYSTEMS NETWORK <wsn@csf.colorado.edu>
Cc: psn@csf.colorado.edu <psn@csf.colorado.edu>
Date: March 29, 2000 10:08 PM
Subject: On Ginis and 1947-1998 US Ginis



...>snip


**********
Selected Reading: Article on Globalization and Inequality

Lundberg, M. and B. Milanovic. 2000. "Globalization and Inequality: Are They
Linked and How?". World Bank: Washington, DC.

Globalization and inequality have recently received a great deal of
attention (Martin Wolf, "The big lie of global inequality", Financial Times,
February 8, 2000). We feel that the discussion has been ......

...>snip