This paper examines the short-term implications of the COVID-19 pandemic for inequality in developing countries. The analysis takes advantage of high-frequency phone survey data collected by the World Bank to assess the distributional impacts of the pandemic through the channels of job and...

Using individual data from over 400 household surveys, this paper compiles a global database of intergenerational mobility in education for 153 countries covering 97 percent of the world’s population. Absolute mobility in education – the share of respondents that obtains higher levels of...

The COVID-19 pandemic has had catastrophic economic and human consequences worldwide. This paper tries to quantify the consequences of the pandemic on global inequality and poverty in 2020. Since face-to-face household survey data collection largely came to a halt during the pandemic, a...

The March 2021 update to PovcalNet involves several changes to the data underlying the global poverty estimates. Some welfare aggregates have been changed for improved harmonization, and the CPI, national accounts, and population input data have been updated. This document explains these changes...

The March 2021 update to PovcalNet involves several changes to the data underlying the global poverty estimates. Some welfare aggregates have been changed for improved harmonization, and the CPI, national accounts, and population input data have been updated. This document explains these changes...

Front Cover -- Contents -- Foreword -- Acknowledgments -- Abbreviations -- Overview -- Introduction -- Intergenerational Mobility in Education around the World -- Pathways to Intergenerational Mobility in Education and Income -- Why Does Intergenerational Mobility Matter? -- Policy Drivers to...

The goals of ending extreme poverty by 2030 and working towards a more equal distribution of incomes are part of the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals. Using data from 166 countries comprising 97.5 percent of the world’s population, we simulate scenarios for global poverty from...

The paper presents a newly compiled and improved database of national household surveys between 1988 and 2008. In 2008, the global Gini index is around 70.5 percent having declined by approximately 2 Gini points over this twenty year period. When it is adjusted for the likely under-reporting of...

In 2013, the World Bank adopted two goals: First, reduce global extreme poverty to 3 percent by 2030. Second, promote shared prosperity defined as the income growth of the bottom 40 percent of the population within a country. This paper simulates the global poverty headcount under three growth...

More than a decade of energy and transport subsidies have weakened Argentina's fiscal capacity. Following the 2001 crisis, public services tariffs were frozen in an attempt to offset the negative effects on households' real purchasing power. However, these subsidies steadily increased over the...