How does wealth distribution affect firm's incentive to innovate better quality goods?
Ling Shen
Economic Modelling, 2013, vol. 32, issue C, 516-523
Abstract:
The paper contributes to the literature relating to inequality and economic growth, in particular, we investigate the effects of wealth distribution on the kind of growth driven by innovation, i.e. Schumpeterian growth. Since two types of individuals are assumed, the poor and the rich, Gini-coefficient is treated in two variables, namely the relative wealth of the poor and the population share of the poor, each having a different effect on economic performance. Particularly in the separating equilibrium, an improvement in the relative wealth of the poor impedes economic growth, but a decline in the population share of the poor enhances economic growth. Furthermore, the current paper combines the Schumpeterian quality improvement model and the neoclassic production function. Thus, the impact of wealth inequality on economic growth is through the supply of human capital as well as the demand for better quality goods. Our results suggest that empirical research on the base of Gini-coefficient cannot generate a general relationship between wealth inequality and economic growth.
Keywords: Inequality; Economic growth (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D31 D43 O12 O15 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2013
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)
Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0264999313000977
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.
Export reference: BibTeX
RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan)
HTML/Text
Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:ecmode:v:32:y:2013:i:c:p:516-523
DOI: 10.1016/j.econmod.2013.02.035
Access Statistics for this article
Economic Modelling is currently edited by S. Hall and P. Pauly
More articles in Economic Modelling from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().