Doctoral Dissertation Research: The Embedded Economy and National Income Inequality

christopher chase - dunanthony roberts加利福尼亚大学河滨分校自20世纪80年代以来，世界上大多数地区普遍存在的国民收入不平等的扩大对既定的收入不平等理论提出了挑战。具体而言，在现有的关于收入不平等的文献中，研究人员已经将经济发展过程、全球化和劳动力市场制度确定为决定国民收入分配的主要因素。然而，很少有研究考虑到这些过程是如何相互关联的，以及这种相互作用是否解释了最近国民收入不平等的增长。本文的主要目的是实证检验一种基于“嵌入经济”概念的新的收入不平等综合理论——市场和社会力量的相互作用。这一综合理论认为，收入不平等的加剧是国家劳动法规和规范变化的结果，而全球制造业和国际机构的出现正在重塑这些法规和规范。本文的目的是利用80个发展中国家和发达国家在25年期间（1985-2010）观察到的面板数据和具有随机和固定效应的结构方程模型来评估三个假设。首先，基于国家劳动立法编码和国家违反劳动报告，本文将使用国际可比的劳动力市场制度化衡量标准，检验劳动力市场制度化是否会减少收入不平等。其次，本文将评估全球生产网络的整合、经济政府间组织的参与以及国际非政府组织的活动是否阻碍或促进了发展中国家劳动力市场制度的形成，同时引发了发达国家劳动力市场制度的新自由主义改革。最后，本文将评估这些过程是否通过对劳动法规和规范的影响间接影响收入不平等。这篇论文的学术价值是基于对收入平等广泛文献的三个理论和实证贡献。首先，本文将发展一种新的理论方法来解释收入不平等，这解释了劳动力市场、制度和全球化之间的相互作用。其次，论文将产生新的纵向数据的劳动法规和做法，为一个大的横截面的国家。最后，本文提出了研究收入不平等跨国差异的方法，即采用多层次结构方程模型来估计近端效应和远端效应。在过去的十年里，收入不平等已经成为发展中国家和发达国家政府面临的一个主要社会问题。拟议研究的结果可能对决策产生若干重要影响。首先，通过考察国家劳动立法对收入不平等的影响，本文将为劳动力市场改革和社会保险政策对减少不平等的有效性提供具体证据。其次，研究结果可以阐明经济和政治全球化如何影响国家决策者制定旨在创造社会公平的经济政策的能力，这为如何在日益全球化的世界中实施新的社会政策和改革提供了见解。鉴于对收入不平等的日益关注，本文将为政策制定者提供解决社会不平等问题的有用信息。

SES-1333693Christopher Chase-DunnAnthony RobertsUniversity of California-RiversideThe ubiquitous growth of national income inequality in most areas of the world since the 1980s has challenged established theories of income inequality. Specifically, in the extant literature on income inequality, researchers have identified processes of economic development, globalization, and labor market institutions as the primary factors determining the distribution of national income. However, few studies have considered how these processes are interrelated and whether this interaction explains the recent growth in national income inequality. The main purpose of this dissertation is to empirically test a new integrative theory of income inequality based on the concept of the 'embedded economy' - the interaction of market and social forces. This integrative theory posits that growing income inequality is the consequence of changes to national labor regulations and norms, which are being reshaped by the emergence of global manufacturing and international institutions. The dissertation aims to assess three hypotheses using panel data on eighty developing and developed countries observed over a twenty-five year period (1985-2010) and structural equation models with random and fixed-effects. First, using an internationally-comparable measure of labor market institutionalization based on the coding of national labor legislation and country reports on labor violations, the dissertation will test whether labor market institutionalization reduces income inequality. Second, the dissertation will assess whether integration in global production networks, participation in economic intergovernmental organization, and the campaigning of international non-governmental organizations hinders or promotes the formation of labor market institutions in developing countries while inducing a neoliberal reform of labor market institutions in developed countries. Finally, the dissertation will assess whether these processes indirectly affects income inequality through their effects on labor regulations and norms. The intellectual merit of the dissertation is based on three theoretical and empirical contributions to the broad literature on income equality. First, the dissertation will develop a new theoretical approach for explaining income inequality which accounts for the interaction between labor markets, institutions, and globalization. Second, the dissertation will produce new longitudinal data on labor regulations and practices for a large cross-section of countries. Finally, the dissertation advances the methodological approach to studying cross-national variation in income inequality by employing multi-level structural equation models for estimating both proximate and distal effects. Broader Impact Over the last ten years, income inequality has become a major social issue for governments in developing and developed countries. Findings from the proposed research could have several important implications for policy-making. First, by examining the effects of national labor legislation on income inequality, the dissertation will provide specific evidence on the effectiveness of labor market reforms and social insurance policies for reducing inequality. Second, the findings could elucidate how economic and political globalization have impacted the capabilities of national policy-makers in enacting economic policy aimed creating social equity, which provides insight on how to implement new social policies and reforms in an increasingly global world. Given the growing concern over income inequality, the dissertation will equip policy-makers with helpful information for addressing issues of social inequality.