Using national income and expenditure distribution data from 119 countries, the authors decompose total income inequality between the individuals in the world, by continent and by region(countries grouped by income level). They use a Gini decomposition that allows for an exact breakdown (without...

This paper updates estimates of the trends in income distribution in the eight countries of the developing East and Southeast Asian region. In the last update by Krongkaew (1994), inequality was found to be increasing in the newly industrialising economies of Hong Kong, Korea, Singapore and...

In Asia inequality in income between countries is more important than inequality within countries. In Africa, Latin America, and Western Europe and North America, by contrast, there are only small differences between countries; inequality within countries is more important. And when countries...

Like the other chapters in this volume of the Handbook of Income Distribution (and its predecessor), the aim of this chapter is to provide a comprehensive review of a particular area of research. We examine the literature on post-1970 trends in poverty and income inequality, up to 2010 or 2011...