Wealth distribution has always been an important issue in our economic and social life, since it affects the harmony and stabilization of the society. Under the background of widely used financial tools to raise leverage these years, we studied the leverage effect on wealth distribution of a population in a controllable laboratory market in which we have conducted several human experiments, and...

It is now clear that the century-long improvement in educational attainment in the United States slowed or declined over the same period during which economic inequality increased. Our research posed questions about the possible relationships between these trends. We asked: Does the increase in economic inequality among families and neighborhoods impede or enhance the overall level of schooling...

The effects of inequality on economic growth depend on several factors. On one hand, they depend on the time horizon considered, on the initial level of income and on its initial distribution. But, on the other hand, as growth and inequality are also uneven across space, it also seems relevant to wonder about the effects of the geographic agglomeration of economic activity. Moreover, it seems r...

Petroleum is a major raw material for the production of fuels, chemicals and materials used in our daily lives. The continuous growth in the consumption of these products requires the increased exploitation of fossil resources. In turn, this exploitation has led to environmental and economic issues linked to climate change, resource depletion and political instabilities due to the unequal distr...

This paper studies the transition of contract enforcement institutions. The prevalence of relational contracts, low legal quality, strong cultural preference for personalistic relationships, low social mobility, and highly unequal endowment form a cluster of mutually reinforcing institutions that hinder economic development. The cultural element per se does not necessarily reduce social welfare...

We develop a heterogeneous-firms model with trade in goods, labor mobility and credit constraints due to moral hazard. Mitigating financial frictions reduces the incentive of high-skilled workers to migrate to one region such that an unequal distribution of industrial activity becomes less likely. Hence, financial market development has opposite regional implications as trade liberalization. Wh...

To the extent of my knowledge, this paper is the first attempt to subject relative income under political economy analysis. The paper will introduce a utility function that includes relative income which will drives our models. According to the model, income distribution will coincide with wage distribution under specific assumptions. An intervention in income distribution may help agents to co...