An international comparison of lifetime labor income values and inequality

Audra Bowlus (1) , Jean-Marc Robin (2, 3, 4)

1 UWO - University of Western Ontario
2 Economics department
3 UP1 - Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne
4 PSE - Paris School of Economics

We compare earnings inequality and mobility across the U.S., Canada, France, Germany and the U.K. during the late 1990s. A flexible model of earnings dynamics that isolates mobility within a stable earnings distribution, allowing, or not, for fixed effects is estimated. Earnings trajectories are then simulated given baseyear earnings and lifetime annuity value distributions are constructed. Equalizing mobility is positively correlated with earnings inequality. The models with and without fixed effects provide upper and lower bounds, respectively, on the resultant lifetime inequality levels, and reveal that the countries have more similar long run inequality levels than cross-section measures suggest.

Mots clés: earnings inequality and mobility across the U.S.; Canada; France; Germany and the U.K. during the late 1990s; stable earnings distribution; similar long run inequality levels

Domaines: Economies et finances

Audra Bowlus, Jean-Marc Robin. An international comparison of lifetime labor income values and inequality: a bounds approach. 2008. ⟨hal-03459796⟩