African Americans
Aid
Calculation
Category=JBFC
Collective action
Collective efficacy
Competition (economics)
Concentrated poverty
Cynicism (contemporary)
Developed country
Development economics
Disadvantage
Economic development
Economic equilibrium
Economic growth
Economic inequality
Economics
Economist
Economy
Employment
Entrepreneurship
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eq_society-politics
Estimation
Ethnic group
Explanation
Externality
Factor endowment
Household
Human capital
Incentive
Income
Income distribution
Industrialisation
Inference
Institution
Latin America
Lock-in (decision-making)
Market analysis
Market economy
Microeconomics
Neighbourhood effect
Nepotism
Norm (social)
Observational study
Opportunity cost
Political economy
Poverty
Poverty trap
Prediction
Private sector
Probability
Productivity
Public policy
Racial segregation
Role model
Samuel Bowles (economist)
Santa Fe Institute
Saving
Slavery
Social relation
Social science
Sociology
Steven N. Durlauf
Suffrage
Supervisor
Supply (economics)
Tax
Total factor productivity
Underclass
Utility
Voucher
Wealth
Product details
- ISBN 9780691170930
- Weight: 340g
- Dimensions: 152 x 235mm
- Publication Date: 31 May 2016
- Publisher: Princeton University Press
- Publication City/Country: US
- Product Form: Paperback
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Much popular belief--and public policy--rests on the idea that those born into poverty have it in their power to escape. But the persistence of poverty and ever-growing economic inequality around the world have led many economists to seriously question the model of individual economic self-determination when it comes to the poor. In Poverty Traps, Samuel Bowles, Steven Durlauf, Karla Hoff, and the book's other contributors argue that there are many conditions that may trap individuals, groups, and whole economies in intractable poverty. For the first time the editors have brought together the perspectives of economics, economic history, and sociology to assess what we know--and don't know--about such traps. Among the sources of the poverty of nations, the authors assign a primary role to social and political institutions, ranging from corruption to seemingly benign social customs such as kin systems. Many of the institutions that keep nations poor have deep roots in colonial history and persist long after their initial causes are gone.
Neighborhood effects--influences such as networks, role models, and aspirations--can create hard-to-escape pockets of poverty even in rich countries. Similar individuals in dissimilar socioeconomic environments develop different preferences and beliefs that can transmit poverty or affluence from generation to generation. The book presents evidence of harmful neighborhood effects and discusses policies to overcome them, with attention to the uncertainty that exists in evaluating such policies.
Samuel Bowles is Research Professor and Director of the Behavioral Sciences Program at the Santa Fe Institute, and Professor of Economics at the University of Siena. Steven N. Durlauf is Kenneth J. Arrow Professor of Economics at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. Karla Hoff is a Senior Research Economist at the World Bank.
