Book Chapter
Transition Approaches, Institutions, and Income Inequality

This chapter examines the trends in income distribution observed since 1989 in the European economies in transition and in China, as well as the factors responsible for the systemic difference in income distribution. It then examines policy reforms which have been carried out and the emerging patterns of changes in income distribution from 1989 to 1997. It analyses changes in income structure and changes in the dispersion of main income components. The chapter argues that differences in the pace and pattern of institutional development explain in part the variation in trends in income inequality and growth performance of the transitional economies over the last decade.