This work, requiring considerable digging for data, was supported by a generous grant from UT's Center for the Study of Western Hemispheric Trade. Every major change in Mexican policy, and every crisis, is reflected clearly in the inequality statistics, right up through the peso crisis of 1995. Our measure of the change in inequality is closely correlated with the real rate of economic growth in Mexico, and we even can articulate a simple rule from this data. Mexico needs a real growth rate of at least 3 percent, just to keep inequality from rising. In each case, movements corresponding with important political and economic events stand out.
Work continues, though the group changes.
He has also correlated inequality and growth for every Latin country. This work can be replicated around the world, and I will present a paper on this at the 1999 Allied Social Science Association meetings. Meanwhile, the Wage Group has received important support from the Ford Foundation and the Jerome Levy Economics Institute, which is planning a 1999 conference around our work. A small office, with our own computers, is now up and running. A web-site is under development, under the care of Wang Qifei, and we are building our modest research archive, thanks to Maggie Liu.