Our studies show that the inequality level in Asia was extremely high in the beginning of 1990s, yet the income gap between rich and poor has widened in the following three decades. The top 1% income share was 19% in the beginning of the 90s, increased gradually to 25% in 2005, and remain at this level afterwards. In contrast the share of total national income of the bottom 50% stagnated below 3% during the entire period. When we look at the top 10% and middle 40%, the results are equally staggering: the gap between top 10% and middle 40% has continuously deepened and in 2019 the top 10% income share in Asia reached to 68% of the total national income in Asia, while the middle 40% only accounted for less than 30%. The rising of top 1% income share in Asia is mainly driving by the sharp rising top shares China, South Korea, and India since 1980s; while the fact that the bottom 50% income shares of Asia is significantly lower than inequality levels within any single Asian economy, shows that between country inequality is still a major factor which explain a significant part of the high inequality levels in Asia.
In order to better understand the natures of rising inequality in Asia context, I conducted two country level studies. First, I narrowed down my focus to China, the biggest economy in the world (by 2020 PPP USD). My study shows that the income inequality in China have raised dramatically since 1980 while the share of public property in national wealth has been decreasing. The top 10 percent income share rose from 27 percent to 41 percent between 1978 and 2015; the bottom 50 percent share dropped from 27 percent to 15 percent. Meanwhile the share of public property declined from 70 percent to 30 percent. Along with the rise of inequality, the composition of China’s economic elites (the top 5% income group in urban China) has also been changed fundamentally, while in 1988, three-quarters of the economic elites were high government officials, clerical staff, or workers, in 2013, the single most important group were professionals, and they, combined with small and large business owners, accounted for over one-half of all economic elites members. Especially, the share of business owners increased from 3% in 1988 to more than 20% in 2013 and there was more than a ten-fold increase in the share of private sector income received by the economic elites. I have conducted similar analysis to Anhui province, as a representative province of the central China region, the results are similar except the trend of rising inequality and privatization is more gradual than the national level.
My second country level study focus on Malaysia, a representative of multiethnic and metaculture country in Asia. My study shows that for the period of 2002 – 2014, Malaysia’s growth features an inclusive redistribution between income classes: the real income growth for the bottom 50% is the highest (5.2%), followed by the middle 40% (4.1%), the top 10% (2.7%) and then the top 1% (1.6%).
Despite of the remarkable overall economic success, it is the rich Bumiputera who benefit the most from the economic growth, i.e. the growth rate of real income per adult accrued to the Bumiputera in the top 1% is 8.3%, which sharply contrasts the much lower growth rate of the Indians (at 3.4%) and negative income growth rates of the Chinese (at -0.6%).
There are three groups of target audiences for us: academic researchers, policymakers, and the general public. By attending academic conference and publishing working papers in academic journals, I communicated and disseminated my research with other researchers. Furthermore, to increase influence of my research among policy makers and the general public, I published articles in the public domain through major news outlets and the World Inequality Report, presented my papers in government institutions (such as the Development Research Center of the State Council of China (DRC) and Malaysia Parliament meeting), and attend meetings and dialogues with multilateral development organizations (such as the United Nations and the World Bank).
