2.C. Children and youth
How does the global distribution of income affect children and
youth? At the global level, most children live in the poorest income
quintiles (Figure 8). When comparing the concentration of youth
populations across global income distribution quintiles, we find that
about half (48.5%) of the world’s young persons are confined to the
bottom two income quintiles. This means that out of the three
billion persons under the age of 24 in the world as of 2007,
approximately 1.5 billion were living in situations in which they and
their families had access to just nine percent of global income. Such
findings are not shocking given that poorer families tend to have
higher fertility rates. Moving up the distribution pyramid, children
and youth do not fare much better: more than two-thirds of the
world’s youth have access to less than 20% of global wealth, with
86% of all young people living on about one-third of world income.
For the just over 400 million youth who are fortunate enough to
rank among families or situations atop the distribution pyramid,
however, opportunities abound with more than 60% of global
income within their reach.
Figure 8. Global Income Distribution and Children/Youth in 2007
in PPP constant 2005 international dollars*Source: Authors’ calculations using World Bank (2011), UNU-WIDER (2008) and United Nations
(2009)
- According to the inter-country accounting model