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Income Inequality and Factors of Economic Freedom

Student: Leshchev Pavel

Supervisor: Ekaterina Trubnikova

Faculty: St.Petersburg School of Economics and Management

Educational Programme: Management (Bachelor)

Year of Graduation: 2021

Income inequality is one of the issues societies all over the world face. It is an actual problem as income inequality affects people's well-being, social climate, and ability to conduct business. This paper aims to analyze the relationships between income inequality and the degree of economic freedom in a country to reveal the sensitive social domains related to this framework. The general practice of connecting income inequality with institutes' performance is widely used as social institutes were established in a society through its history and transmitted across generations over a long period. It was decided to use the Freedom Index developed by Heritage experts. The research will be conducted using a sample of more than 140 countries with available data for economic freedom and income inequality for the period from 2008 to 2018. The analysis will also consider countries with different degrees of market development. The relations will be analyzed through building several regression analyses: regression models for panel cross-sectional data for the whole sample and for subgroups based on regions, stage of economic development, and whether the country exports fuel or not. It is expected that different subcomponents of economic freedom will affect income inequality in opposite ways. It is also anticipated that the same subcomponent may affect inequality differently depending on whether the state market development is related to developed or developing groups of markets. Research's contribution is providing the elements of social life which significantly affect income inequality. This information could help future researchers and businesses to develop strategies and make decisions about entering new markets or leaving existing ones.

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