Deaton Review Country Studies: A Trans-Atlantic Comparison of Inequalities in Incomes and Outcomes over Five Decades – TACI

The aim of this project is to examine a broad set of inequalities over the last five decades in a coherent framework across the major economies of North America and Europe. This project will provide a major source for comparative research on inequality trends and will be a key element of the Deaton Review of Inequalities. The focus will be on inequalities in employment, human capital, earnings and family income during working life. There are 17 country-based research teams involved with extensive experience in the analysis of survey and administrative micro-data sources and leading expertise in the measurement of inequality. Each team is responsible for their country-specific data, which will draw from both major household surveys and administrative records, but all analyses are coordinated across countries to provide harmonious treatment of variable definition and estimation. The first part of each study will describe inequalities in the key economic and social variables including measures of income, earnings, consumption, wealth inequalities, and to decompose these by age, education, gender, race, ethnicity and demographic group. The second part of each study will allow the country authors to highlight the key inequality issues in their country, the policy successes and the policy failures, including issues relating to COVID-19. For example, what pre-existing economic, geographical, racial or ethnic inequalities have been particularly highlighted by COVID-19? Is the pandemic making them worse or better? Are there new inequalities that COVID-19 had made important? The results of the 17 country reports will be synthesized in a series of jointly-authored papers highlighting key differences and commonalities across the economies on outcomes and policy responses.