IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/wdevel/v62y2014icp42-61.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Is Globalization Reducing Absolute Poverty?

Author

Listed:
  • Bergh, Andreas
  • Nilsson, Therese

Abstract

Using data from 114 countries (1983–2007), we examine the relationship between globalization and World Bank absolute poverty estimates. We find a significant negative correlation between globalization and poverty, robust to several econometric specifications, including a fixed-effect panel—a “long run” first difference—and a pooled OLS-regression. Introducing two instruments for globalization we also show that results are robust to correction for potential endogeneity. We motivate and test the instruments in several ways. In particular information flows and more liberal trade restrictions robustly correlate with lower absolute poverty.

Suggested Citation

  • Bergh, Andreas & Nilsson, Therese, 2014. "Is Globalization Reducing Absolute Poverty?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 62(C), pages 42-61.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:wdevel:v:62:y:2014:i:c:p:42-61
    DOI: 10.1016/j.worlddev.2014.04.007
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0305750X14001065
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.worlddev.2014.04.007?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Ann Harrison, 2007. "Globalization and Poverty," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number harr06-1, June.
    2. ,, 2001. "Problems And Solutions," Econometric Theory, Cambridge University Press, vol. 17(6), pages 1157-1160, December.
    3. Joshua D. Angrist & Alan B. Krueger, 2001. "Instrumental Variables and the Search for Identification: From Supply and Demand to Natural Experiments," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 15(4), pages 69-85, Fall.
    4. J. Behrman & T.N. Srinivasan (ed.), 1995. "Handbook of Development Economics," Handbook of Development Economics, Elsevier, edition 1, volume 3, number 4.
    5. repec:pri:rpdevs:deaton_price_indexes_inequality_and_the_measurement_of_world_poverty_aer. is not listed on IDEAS
    6. Martin Gassebner & Noel Gaston & Michael J. Lamla, 2011. "The Inverse Domino Effect: Are Economic Reforms Contagious?," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 52(1), pages 183-200, February.
    7. Barry Eichengreen & David Leblang, 2008. "Democracy And Globalization," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 20(3), pages 289-334, November.
    8. Romain Wacziarg & Karen Horn Welch, 2008. "Trade Liberalization and Growth: New Evidence," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 22(2), pages 187-231, June.
    9. Yanikkaya, Halit, 2003. "Trade openness and economic growth: a cross-country empirical investigation," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 72(1), pages 57-89, October.
    10. Elbers, Chris & Lanjouw, Peter, 2001. "Intersectoral Transfer, Growth, and Inequality in Rural Ecuador," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 29(3), pages 481-496, March.
    11. Dutt, Pushan & Mitra, Devashish & Ranjan, Priya, 2009. "International trade and unemployment: Theory and cross-national evidence," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 78(1), pages 32-44, June.
    12. Paolo Verme, 2010. "A structural analysis of growth and poverty in the short-term," Journal of Developing Areas, Tennessee State University, College of Business, vol. 43(2), pages 19-39, January-M.
    13. Anand, Sudhir & Segal, Paul & Stiglitz, Joseph E. (ed.), 2010. "Debates on the Measurement of Global Poverty," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199558049.
    14. Deaton, Angus, 1995. "Data and econometric tools for development analysis," Handbook of Development Economics, in: Hollis Chenery & T.N. Srinivasan (ed.), Handbook of Development Economics, edition 1, volume 3, chapter 33, pages 1785-1882, Elsevier.
    15. Chao, Chi-Chur & Hazari, Bharat R. & Sgro, Pasquale M., 2004. "Tourism, globalization, social externalities, and domestic welfare," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 18(2), pages 141-149, June.
    16. Dani Rodrik, 1998. "Why Do More Open Economies Have Bigger Governments?," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 106(5), pages 997-1032, October.
    17. Dreher, Axel, 2006. "The influence of globalization on taxes and social policy: An empirical analysis for OECD countries," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 22(1), pages 179-201, March.
    18. Sinn, Hans-Werner, 1997. "The selection principle and market failure in systems competition," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(2), pages 247-274, November.
    19. Bergh, Andreas & Nilsson, Therese, 2010. "Do liberalization and globalization increase income inequality?," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 26(4), pages 488-505, December.
    20. Axel Dreher & Noel Gaston, 2008. "Has Globalization Increased Inequality?," Review of International Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 16(3), pages 516-536, August.
    21. Mattias Lundberg & Lyn Squire, 2003. "The simultaneous evolution of growth and inequality," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 113(487), pages 326-344, April.
    22. Pierre-Richard Agénor, 2004. "Does globalization hurt the poor?," International Economics and Economic Policy, Springer, vol. 1(1), pages 21-51, March.
    23. Ackerman, Karen & MacDonald, Stephen & Milmoe, Steve, 1990. "International Trade," Food Review/ National Food Review, United States Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service, vol. 13(3), September.
    24. Ann Harrison & Margaret McMillan, 2007. "On the links between globalization and poverty," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 5(1), pages 123-134, April.
    25. Jenny C. Aker & Isaac M. Mbiti, 2010. "Mobile Phones and Economic Development in Africa," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 24(3), pages 207-232, Summer.
    26. Angus Deaton, 2010. "Price Indexes, Inequality, and the Measurement of World Poverty," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(1), pages 5-34, March.
    27. J. Behrman & T.N. Srinivasan (ed.), 1995. "Handbook of Development Economics," Handbook of Development Economics, Elsevier, edition 1, volume 3, number 3.
    28. Paul Mosley & Abrar Suleiman, 2007. "Aid, Agriculture and Poverty in Developing Countries," Review of Development Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 11(1), pages 139-158, February.
    29. Michelle A. Mendez & Barry M. Popkin, 2004. "Globalization, Urbanization and Nutritional Change in the Developing World," The Electronic Journal of Agricultural and Development Economics, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, vol. 1(2), pages 220-241.
    30. Raghuram G. Rajan & Arvind Subramanian, 2008. "Aid and Growth: What Does the Cross-Country Evidence Really Show?," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 90(4), pages 643-665, November.
    31. Heckelman, Jac C. & Stroup, Michael D., 2005. "A comparison of aggregation methods for measures of economic freedom," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 21(4), pages 953-966, December.
    32. Kalwij, Adriaan & Verschoor, Arjan, 2007. "Not by growth alone: The role of the distribution of income in regional diversity in poverty reduction," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 51(4), pages 805-829, May.
    33. repec:pri:rpdevs:presidential%20address%2017january%202010%20all.pdf is not listed on IDEAS
    34. Salih Katircioglu, 2009. "Tourism, trade and growth: the case of Cyprus," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 41(21), pages 2741-2750.
    35. Heston, Alan, 1994. "A brief review of some problems in using national accounts data in level of output comparisons and growth studies," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 44(1), pages 29-52, June.
    36. ,, 2001. "Problems And Solutions," Econometric Theory, Cambridge University Press, vol. 17(5), pages 1025-1031, October.
    37. repec:fth:prinin:455 is not listed on IDEAS
    38. Nathan Yang, 2012. "Burger King and McDonald’s: Where’s the Spillover?," International Journal of the Economics of Business, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 19(2), pages 255-281, July.
    39. Jeffrey D. Sachs & Andrew Warner, 1995. "Economic Reform and the Process of Global Integration," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 26(1, 25th A), pages 1-118.
    40. David Dollar & Aart Kraay, 2004. "Trade, Growth, and Poverty," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 114(493), pages 22-49, February.
    41. Harrison, Ann (ed.), 2007. "Globalization and Poverty," National Bureau of Economic Research Books, University of Chicago Press, number 9780226318004, October.
    42. Indra de Soysa & Krishna Chaitanya Vadlamannati, 2011. "Does Being Bound Together Suffocate, or Liberate? The Effects of Economic, Social, and Political Globalization on Human Rights, 1981–2005," Kyklos, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 64(1), pages 20-53, February.
    43. Wade, Robert Hunter, 2004. "Is Globalization Reducing Poverty and Inequality?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 32(4), pages 567-589, April.
    44. Aisbett, Emma & Harrison, Ann & Zwane, Alix, 2006. "Globalization and poverty: what is the evidence?," MPRA Paper 36595, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    45. Stark, Oded, 2004. "Rethinking the Brain Drain," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 32(1), pages 15-22, January.
    46. Kim, So Young, 2007. "Openness, External Risk, and Volatility: Implications for the Compensation Hypothesis," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 61(1), pages 181-216, January.
    47. Jagdish Bhagwati, 2002. "Trade and Poverty in the Poor Countries," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(2), pages 180-183, May.
    48. repec:pri:rpdevs:presidential%20address%2017january%202010%20all is not listed on IDEAS
    49. Ravallion, Martin, 2006. "Looking beyond averages in the trade and poverty debate," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 34(8), pages 1374-1392, August.
    50. Forestier, Emmanuel & Grace, Jeremy & Kenny, Charles, 2002. "Can information and communication technologies be pro-poor?," Telecommunications Policy, Elsevier, vol. 26(11), pages 623-646, December.
    51. Joshua Angrist & Alan Krueger, 2001. "Instrumental Variables and the Search for Identification: From Supply and Demand to Natural Experiments," Working Papers 834, Princeton University, Department of Economics, Industrial Relations Section..
    52. Francois Bourguignon, 2004. "The Poverty-growth-inequality triangle," Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations, New Delhi Working Papers 125, Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations, New Delhi, India.
    53. Noguer, Marta & Siscart, Marc, 2005. "Trade raises income: a precise and robust result," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 65(2), pages 447-460, March.
    54. World Bank, 2010. "World Development Indicators 2010," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 4373.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Bergh, Andreas & Nilsson, Therese, 2011. "Globalization and Absolute Poverty – A Panel Data Study," Working Paper Series 862, Research Institute of Industrial Economics.
    2. Noumba, Issidor & Noula, Armand Gilbert & Nguea, Stéphane Mbiankeu, 2022. "Do globalization and resource rents matter for human well-being? Evidence from African countries," International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 170(C), pages 49-65.
    3. Bergh, Andreas & Nilsson, Therese, 2009. "Good for living? On the relation between globalization and life expectancy," Working Papers 2009:9, Lund University, Department of Economics.
    4. Kehinde Oluseyi Olagunju & Adebayo Isaiah Ogunniyi & Kunle Francis Oguntegbe & Ibrahim Oluwole Raji & Kolawole Ogundari, 2019. "Welfare Impact of Globalization in Developing Countries: Examining the Mediating Role of Human Capital," Economies, MDPI, vol. 7(3), pages 1-24, August.
    5. Emma Aisbett, 2007. "Why are the Critics So Convinced that Globalization is Bad for the Poor?," NBER Chapters, in: Globalization and Poverty, pages 33-86, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. Ayesha Naz, 2023. "Linkages between different types of globalization and socio-economic variables: panel data analysis for 129 countries," Journal of Economic Structures, Springer;Pan-Pacific Association of Input-Output Studies (PAPAIOS), vol. 12(1), pages 1-23, December.
    7. Ann Harrison, 2007. "Globalization and Poverty," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number harr06-1, June.
    8. Potrafke, Niklas, 2013. "Globalization and labor market institutions: International empirical evidence," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(3), pages 829-842.
    9. Bergh, Andreas & Nilsson, Therese, 2010. "Good for Living? On the Relationship between Globalization and Life Expectancy," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 38(9), pages 1191-1203, September.
    10. Berggren, Niclas & Nilsson, Therese, 2015. "Globalization and the transmission of social values: The case of tolerance," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 43(2), pages 371-389.
    11. Niklas Potrafke, 2015. "The Evidence on Globalisation," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 38(3), pages 509-552, March.
    12. Pleninger, Regina & Sturm, Jan-Egbert, 2020. "The effects of economic globalisation and ethnic fractionalisation on redistribution," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 130(C).
    13. Olukayode Emmanuel Maku & Olorunfemi Yasiru Alimi & Fidelis Obioma Ogwumike, 2021. "Transmission Mechanism of Globalization and Its Impact on Human Welfare Development in Sub-Saharan African Countries," Business & Management Compass, University of Economics Varna, issue 1, pages 45-64.
    14. Björn Kauder & Niklas Potrafke, 2015. "Globalization and social justice in OECD countries," Review of World Economics (Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv), Springer;Institut für Weltwirtschaft (Kiel Institute for the World Economy), vol. 151(2), pages 353-376, May.
    15. Shreya Pal, 2024. "Do economic globalization and the level of education impede poverty levels? A non-linear ARDL approach," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 22(3), pages 621-667, September.
    16. Nissanke, Machiko & Thorbecke, Erik, 2006. "Channels and policy debate in the globalization-inequality-poverty nexus," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 34(8), pages 1338-1360, August.
    17. Ann Harrison, 2007. "Globalization and Poverty: An Introduction," NBER Chapters, in: Globalization and Poverty, pages 1-32, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    18. Walker Wright, 2020. "How trade openness can help to ‘deliver the poor and needy’," Economic Affairs, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 40(1), pages 100-107, February.
    19. Le, Minh Son, 2014. "Trade openness and household welfare within a country: A microeconomic analysis of Vietnamese households," Journal of Asian Economics, Elsevier, vol. 33(C), pages 56-70.
    20. Harrison, Ann E. & Rodriguez-Clare, Andres, 2009. "Trade, Foreign Investment, and Industrial Policy," MPRA Paper 15561, University Library of Munich, Germany.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:wdevel:v:62:y:2014:i:c:p:42-61. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/worlddev .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.