Heterogeneous wealth dynamics: On the roles of risk and ability

Paulo Santos and Christopher Barrett

No 36-16, Monash Economics Working Papers from Monash University, Department of Economics

Abstract: This paper studies the causal mechanisms behind persistent poverty. Using original data on Boran pastoralists of southern Ethiopia, we find that heterogeneous and nonlinear wealth dynamics arise purely in adverse states of nature. In favorable states, expected herd grow is quasi-linear and universal. We further show that those with lower herding ability, as reflected in past herd growth data, converge to a unique equilibrium at a small herd size while those with higher ability exhibit multiple stable dynamic wealth equilibria.

Pages: 39 pages
Date: 2016-11
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-agr
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (19)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.monash.edu/__data/assets/pdf_file/0007 ... oussantosbarrett.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Chapter: Heterogeneous Wealth Dynamics: On the Roles of Risk and Ability (2017)
Working Paper: Heterogeneous Wealth Dynamics: On the Roles of Risk and Ability (2016)
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:mos:moswps:2016-36

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
https://www.monash.e ... esearch/publications

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Monash Economics Working Papers from Monash University, Department of Economics Department of Economics, Monash University, Victoria 3800, Australia. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Simon Angus ().