All of the recent empirical work on the relationship between income inequality and economic growth has used inequality data that are not consistently measured. This paper argues that this is inappropriate and shows that the significant negative correlation often found between income inequality...

The paper introduces the concept of social divergence, defined as the social barriers to communication and exchange between individuals and groups within a society, and analyses its impact on total factor productivity and per capita income. Using a cross section of 27 developing countries, total...