Kalpana Kochhar

Causes and Consequences of Income Inequality; A Global Perspective

This paper analyzes the extent of income inequality from a global perspective, its drivers, and what to do about it. The drivers of inequality vary widely amongst countries, with some common drivers being the skill premium associated with technical change and globalization, weakening protection for labor, and lack of financial inclusion in developing countries. We find that increasing the income share of the poor and the middle class actually increases growth while a rising income share of the top 20 percent results in lower growth—that is, when the rich get richer, benefits do not trickle down. This suggests that policies need to be country specific but should focus on raising the income share of the poor, and ensuring there is no hollowing out of the middle class. To tackle inequality, financial inclusion is imperative in emerging and developing countries while in advanced economies, policies should focus on raising human capital and skills and making tax systems more progressive.

Women, Work, and the Economy:Macroeconomic Gains from Gender Equity

The proposed SDN discusses the specific macro-critical aspects of women’s participation in the labor market and the constraints that prevent women from developing their full economic potential. Building on earlier Fund analysis, work undertaken by other organizations and academic research, the SDN presents possible policies to overcome these obstacles in different types of countries.

The East Asian Crisis: Macroeconomic Developments and Policy Lessons

This paper reviews macroeconomic developments during the first year of the crisis in east Asia and draws some preliminary policy lessons. The crisis is rooted in the interaction of large capital inflows and weak private and public sector governance. At the same time, macroeconomic adjustment in these countries has resulted in some surprising outcomes, including severe economic contractions, low inflation, and rapid external adjustment. The lessons for crisis resolution include the importance of tight monetary policy early on for exchange rate stabilization, flexible fiscal policy, and comprehensive structural reform. Crises are avoided by prudent macroeconomic policies, diligent bank supervision, transparent data dissemination, strong governance, and forward-looking policymaking, even in good times.

Malaysian Capital Controls; Macroeconomics and Institutions

We analyze the capital controls imposed in Malaysia in September 1998. In macroeconomic terms, these controls neither yielded major benefits nor were costly. At the same time, the stock market interpreted the capital controls (and associated events) as favoring firms with stronger political connections, and some connected firms reportedly received advantages immediately following the crisis. Analysis of financial accounts indicates that connected firms outperformed unconnected firms before the 1997-98 crisis but not afterward. After the crisis, connected firms were either not supported as much as the market had expected or the benefits they received were not manifest in their published accounts.

Bank ownership and the effects of financial liberalization: evidence from India

Do financial sector reforms necessarily result in expansion of credit to the private sector? How does bank ownership affect the availability of credit to the private sector? Empirical evidence is somewhat mixed on these issues. We use the Indian experience with liberalization of the financial sector to inform this debate. Using bank-level data from 1991-2007, we ask whether public and private banks deployed resources freed up by reduced state preemption to increase credit to the private sector. We find that even after liberalization, public banks allocated a larger share of their assets to government securities than did private banks. Crucially, we also find that public banks were more responsive in allocating relatively more resources to finance the fiscal deficit even during periods when state pre-emption (measured in terms of the requirement to hold government securities as a share of assets) formally declined. These findings suggest that in developing countries, where alternative channels of financing may be limited, government ownership of banks, combined with high fiscal deficits, may limit the gains from financial liberalization.

The New Normal : A Sector-level Perspective on Productivity Trends in Advanced Economies

Total factor productivity growth was stagnant or slowing in many advanced countries even prior to the crisis. This paper documents sector-level productivity patterns across advanced economies prior to the crisis and examines the role of product and labor market rigidities as well as innovation and investments in information technology and human capital in driving productivity differences across sectors and countries. Since productivity payoffs of reforms evolve over time, we also focus on large changes in the structural indicators examine their dynamic impact on productivity, employment, and output. Our results suggest that reform priorities depend on country-specific settings, including the scale of specific policy distortions and the distance from the technology frontier. Productivity gains from reforms are large and materialize predominantly in the medium term, with some important variations across industries and countries.

Fair Play; More Equal Laws Boost Female Labor Force Participation

This Staff Discussion Note examines the effect of gender-based legal restrictions and other policy choices and demographic characteristics on female labor force participation. Drawing on a large and novel panel data set of gender-related legal restrictions, the study finds that restrictions on women’s rights to inheritance and property, as well as legal impediments to undertaking economic activities such as opening a bank account or freely pursuing a profession, are strongly associated with larger gender gaps in labor force participation. These factors have a significant additional impact on female labor force participation over and above the effects of demographic characteristics and policies. In many cases, the gender gaps caused by these restrictions also have macro-critical effects in terms of an impact on GDP. The results from this study suggest that it would be beneficial to level the playing field by removing obstacles that prevent women from becoming economically active if they choose to do so. In recommending equal opportunities, however, this study does not intend to render a judgment of countries’ broadly accepted cultural and religious norms.

Emerging Markets in Transition; Growth Prospects and Challenges

After a short-lived slowdown in the immediate aftermath of the global financial crisis and a swift rebound, emerging markets (EM) are now entering a period of slower growth. In fact, growth is now lower than the post-crisis peak of 2010-11, as well as the rates seen in the decade before the crisis. This raises the question of whether EMs can bounce back to the growth rates seen in the last decade or whether their prospects are dimmer than thought a few years ago. This SDN we will explore the drivers of the slowdown, how changes in external conditions that supported high growth in EMs will affect them over the medium term, and the policy priorities needed to sustain the growth rates seen in the past decades. In doing so, the paper differentiates EMs along various dimensions (e.g. degree of commodity dependence, trade and financial openness) to highlight the need to tailor policy priorities.

Catalyst for Change; Empowering Women and Tackling Income Inequality

This study shows empirically that gender inequality and income inequality are strongly interlinked, even after controlling for standard drivers of income inequality. The study analyzes gender inequality by using and extending the United Nation’s Gender Inequality Index (GII) to cover two decades for almost 140 countries,. The main finding is that an increase in the GII from perfect gender equality to perfect inequality is associated with an almost 10 points higher net Gini coefficient. For advanced countries, with higher gender equity in opportunities, income inequality arises mainly through gender gaps in economic participation. For emerging market and developing countries, inequality of opportunity, in particular in education and health, appear to pose larger obstacles to income equality.

Women Workers in India; Why So Few Among So Many?

This paper examines the determinants of female labor force participation in India, against the backdrop of India having one of the lowest participation rates for women among peer countries. Using extensive Indian household survey data, we model the labor force participation choices of women, conditional on demographic characteristics and education, as well as looking at the influence of state-level labor market flexibility and other state policies. Our main finding is that a number of policy initiatives can help boost female economic participation in the states of India, including increased labor market flexibility, investment in infrastructure, and enhanced social spending.