- Income Inequality at the National Level
Looking at income distribution quintile estimates using recent data,
some of the highest national disparities are found in countries like
Colombia, Nepal, Russia and Zambia, despite recent governments’
efforts to address it, while some of the most equal societies are
found in countries like Australia, Azerbaijan, France and Sweden
(Figure 17).
Figure 17. Snapshot of High and Low Inequality in Selected
Countries, 2007 (or latest available)Source: World Bank (2011), UNU-WIDER (2008) and Eurostat (2011)Figure 18. GDP Growth and High Inequality in Selected Countries, 1990- 2005
Source: World Bank (2011) and UNU-WIDER (2008)Such differences could lead us to think that equality is a result of
fast or sustained GDP growth over long periods of time. However,
this is not necessarily the case. Income distribution data in China,
India and the United States, which have ranked among the largest
and strongest growing economies in the world over the past
decades, suggest otherwise (Figure 18). In all three cases, significant
and sustained economic growth (annual GDP per capita growth of