Intergroup Economic Inequality Across Countries: An lntroductory Essay

Abstract

Increased research attention is now being given to understanding patterns of and ethnic economic inequality across countries (see Nesiah 1997; Darity 1998; Darity and Nembhard 2000; Darity and Deshpande 2000). Among the major general findings that have emerged from these recent comparative inquiries are the following: 1 Countries with a lower general level of income inequality do not necessarily display lower levels of intergroup inequality 2 Intergroup disparity is persistent and significant in countries at all levels of development, whether development is measured narrowly by per capita income or more broadly by a more encompassing index of well-being, like the Human Development Index. 3 Greater gender equity is not generally associated with lower levels of intergroup equality. 4 Higher rates of economic growth do not invariably close economic gaps between and ethnic groups nor does lower economic growth inevitably widen the gap. 5 Intergroup division at sufficiently high levels of tension to produce civil war conditions or genocidal violence obviously is inimical with economic development, but the mere fact of intergroup economic inequality is not. 6 In all countries where statistical investigations have been undertaken to assess the presence of discrimination in employment markets, substantial evidence of discriminatory losses in earnings and occupational status consistently are detected against a subaltern group. These results are complemented by the findings of direct tests of employment discrimination conducted via audit studies. 7 Cross-national evidence does not indicate that employment discrimination necessarily declines overtime, even in strongly market-oriented economies. 8 Adoption and implementation of remedies for intergroup disparity, such as affirmation action programs have not proven sufficient to close the gap anywhere, but, there is good evidence to suggest that the gaps would be even wider in the absence of such programs. One phase of the comparative inquiry involves construction of and examination of cross-section, cross-country macro-level data at the international level on a variety of country characteristics and on group economic differences within each country. A second phase of the comparative inquiry involves development of increasingly detailed and accurate accounts of intergroup disparity for each country. The six papers that comprise this symposium in The Review of Social Economy contribute directly to the second phase of the comparative inquiry. Two of the papers deepen our knowledge of the empirical gaps between groups and the extent of estimated employment discrimination in Brazil and in Canada. Peggy Lovell's contribution on Brazil consolidates the puncturing of the still popular myth, the myth of racial democracy, that Brazil is a country where inequality is solely a matter of social class and not race. France Twine's (1998) superb ethnographic study, Racism in a Racial Democracy, provides an effective qualitative demolition of the myth, while Lovell's work provides the detailed quantitative dimension. Lovell demonstrates sustained and significant disparities persist between Afro-Brazilians, both blacks and browns, and Euro-Brazilians or whites. She also demonstrates that employment discrimination is an important factor depressing the earnings and occupational attainment of both black and brown Brazilians and examines the spatial aspects of disparity and discrimination. In an earlier coauthored study, Morton Stelcner (Stelcner and Kyriazis 1995) examined earnings inequality, by race and ethnicity in Canada, using the 1981 Canadian census. The current essay comprehensively reviews the existing literature on intergroup disparity in Canada based upon a variety of surveys and updates the findings from Stelcner-Kyriazis by utilising the 1991 census. A striking result is the persistence across both censuses of employment discrimination against blacks in Canada. …