Employing comparative and quantitative historical methods Frankema explores long run trends of asset and income distribution in Latin America, arguing that there is little reason to regard the yawning gap between rich and poor as the persistent result of a colonial heritage.

This chapter provides new evidence on educational inequality and reviews the literature on the causes and consequences of unequal education. We document large achievement gaps between children from different socio-economic backgrounds, show how patterns of educational inequality vary across...