IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/etr/series/v3y2012i5p210-221.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Remittances and income inequality in rural Nigeria

Author

Listed:
  • Olowa Olatomide Waheed

    (Department of Agricultural Education, Federal College of Education (Technical) Akoka)

  • Adebayo M. Shittu

    (Department of Agricultural Economics and Management, Federal University of Agriculture, Abeokuta)

Abstract

The paper studies the effect of remittances on inequality in rural Nigeria using the Nigeria Living standard survey collected in 2004 by Nigeria Bureau of Statistics. This study decomposed income inequality in rural Nigeria using the Gini-decomposition and regression-based approaches to investigate the contribution of remittance to income inequality in Rural Nigeria. Results shows Domestic remittances seem more likely to be income equalizing than foreign remittances. Education is associated with lower domestic remittances and higher international remittances, probably reflecting the role of education in promoting international versus domestic migration. An increase in schooling increases inequality through domestic remittances and decreases inequality through international remittances, while a reduction in household size reduces inequality through both domestic and international remittances. This analysis highlights the importance of the distinction between domestic and international remittances as drivers of inequality as well as the importance of identifying and quantifying the determinants of remittances and their subsequent impact on inequality.

Suggested Citation

  • Olowa Olatomide Waheed & Adebayo M. Shittu, 2012. "Remittances and income inequality in rural Nigeria," E3 Journal of Business Management and Economics., E3 Journals, vol. 3(5), pages 210-221.
    • Handle: RePEc:etr:series:v:3:y:2012:i:5:p:210-221
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.e3journals.org/cms/articles/1336845778_Olowa%20and%20Adebayo.pdf
    File Function: Full text
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Adams, Richard H, Jr, 1991. "The Economic Uses and Impact of International Remittances in Rural Egypt," Economic Development and Cultural Change, University of Chicago Press, vol. 39(4), pages 695-722, July.
    2. Adams, Richard Jr. & Page, John, 2005. "Do international migration and remittances reduce poverty in developing countries?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 33(10), pages 1645-1669, October.
    3. Jonathan Morduch & Terry Sicular, 2002. "Rethinking Inequality Decomposition, With Evidence from Rural China," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 112(476), pages 93-106, January.
    4. Kanbur, Ravi & Lustig, Nora, 1999. "Why is Inequality Back on the Agenda?," Working Papers 127690, Cornell University, Department of Applied Economics and Management.
    5. Adams, Richard H. Jr., 2003. "International migration, remittances, and the brain drain ; a study of 24 labor exporting countries," Policy Research Working Paper Series 3069, The World Bank.
    6. Acosta, Pablo & Calderon, Cesar & Fajnzylber, Pablo & Lopez, Humberto, 2008. "What is the Impact of International Remittances on Poverty and Inequality in Latin America?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 36(1), pages 89-114, January.
    7. Kimhi, Ayal, 2010. "International Remittances, Domestic Remittances, and Income Inequality in the Dominican Republic," Discussion Papers 93130, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Department of Agricultural Economics and Management.
    8. Lanzona, Leonardo A., 1998. "Migration, self-selection and earnings in Philippine rural communities," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 56(1), pages 27-50, June.
    9. Lerman, Robert I & Yitzhaki, Shlomo, 1985. "Income Inequality Effects by Income," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 67(1), pages 151-156, February.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Siriwardhane, Dinesha & Amaratunge, Sampath, 2018. "Remittances and Risk Diversification in Developing Country Context: Evidence from Sri Lanka," MPRA Paper 107235, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 04 Jun 2018.
    2. Muhammad Shahbaz & Ijaz Rehman & Nurul Mahdzan, 2014. "Linkages between income inequality, international remittances and economic growth in Pakistan," Quality & Quantity: International Journal of Methodology, Springer, vol. 48(3), pages 1511-1535, May.

    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. Kimhi, Ayal, 2010. "International Remittances, Domestic Remittances, and Income Inequality in the Dominican Republic," Discussion Papers 93130, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Department of Agricultural Economics and Management.
    2. Nguyen Viet Cuong, 2009. "The impact of international and internal remittances on household welfare: evidence from Viet Nam," Asia-Pacific Development Journal, United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), vol. 16(1), pages 59-92, June.
    3. Nguyen Viet, Cuong, 2008. "Impacts of International and Internal Remittances on Household Welfare: Evidence from Viet Nam," MPRA Paper 25770, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    4. Siddique, Hafiz Muhammad Abubakar & Shehzadi, Iram & Manzoor, Muhammad Rizwan & Majeed, Muhammad Tariq, 2016. "Do international migration and remittances reduce poverty in developing countries?," MPRA Paper 71246, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 2016.
    5. Petreski, Marjan & Jovanovic, Branimir, 2013. "Do Remittances Reduce Poverty and Inequality in the Western Balkans? Evidence from Macedonia," MPRA Paper 51413, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    6. Abbas, Syed Ali & Selvanathan, Saroja & Selvanathan, Eliyathamby A., 2023. "Structural transformation, urbanization, and remittances in developing countries: A panel VAR analysis," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 79(C), pages 55-69.
    7. de Haas, Hein, 2009. "Mobility and Human Development," MPRA Paper 19176, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    8. Ibrahim Sirkeci & Jeffrey H. Cohen & Dilip Ratha, 2012. "Migration and Remittances during the Global Financial Crisis and Beyond," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 13092.
    9. Puja Guha, 2014. "Economics of Migration and Remittances: A Review Article," Working Papers id:5618, eSocialSciences.
    10. Sanjaya DeSilva, 2013. "Long-Term Benefits from Temporary Migration: Does the Gender of the Migrant Matter?," Economics Working Paper Archive wp_756, Levy Economics Institute.
    11. Adenutsi, Deodat E., 2011. "Do remittances alleviate poverty and income inequality in poor countries? Empirical evidence from sub-Saharan Africa," MPRA Paper 37130, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    12. Cephas Naanwaab & Osei Agyeman Yeboah, 2013. "Migrant remittances and human capital investments," Review of Applied Socio-Economic Research, Pro Global Science Association, vol. 6(2), pages 191-202, December.
    13. Hajer Habib, 2023. "Remittances and Labor Supply: Evidence from Tunisia," Journal of the Knowledge Economy, Springer;Portland International Center for Management of Engineering and Technology (PICMET), vol. 14(2), pages 1870-1899, June.
    14. Ziesemer, Thomas H.W., 2010. "The impact of the credit crisis on poor developing countries: Growth, worker remittances, accumulation and migration," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 27(5), pages 1230-1245, September.
    15. Michele Giammatteo, 2006. "Inequality in Transition Countries: The Contributions of Markets and Government Taxes and Transfers," LIS Working papers 443, LIS Cross-National Data Center in Luxembourg.
    16. Konte, Maty, 2016. "The effects of remittances on support for democracy in Africa: Are remittances a curse or a blessing?," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 44(4), pages 1002-1022.
    17. Roland Craigwell & Mahalia Jackman & Winston Moore, 2010. "Economic volatility and remittances," International Journal of Development Issues, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 9(1), pages 25-42, April.
    18. Qiuqiong Huang & David Dawe & Scott Rozelle & Jikun Huang & Jinxia Wang, 2005. "Irrigation, poverty and inequality in rural China," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 49(2), pages 159-175, June.
    19. Arapi-Gjini, Arjola & Möllers, Judith & Herzfeld, Thomas, 2020. "Measuring dynamic effects of remittances on poverty and inequality with evidence from Kosovo," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 58(4), pages 283-308.
    20. Cuong Viet Nguyen & Thai Pham Minh, 2016. "Are migrants in large cities underpaid? Evidence from Vietnam," IZA Journal of Migration and Development, Springer;Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit GmbH (IZA), vol. 5(1), pages 1-23, December.

    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:etr:series:v:3:y:2012:i:5:p:210-221. 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: Andrew Godwin (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    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.