Institutional quality and income inequality in the advanced countries

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to shed more light on the effects of changes in quality of economic, legal and political institutions on income inequality in the advanced countries over the last two decades. Using the robust panel model on a sample of 21 OECD countries, it is found that the impact of elitization of society is more pronounced than the impact of unionization on income redistribution, but both effects are less expressed in comparison to the influence of institutional changes on redistribution. In a globalized economy, insufficient redistribution and high inequality might be interpreted as the consequence of institutional inertia to disruptive technological and business changes.

Keywords

• income inequality
• institutions
• redistribution
• elites