The Impact of Institutional Quality on Income Distribution: An Empirical Analysis for Developed and Developing Countries

The objective of this study is to investigate the impact of institutional quality on income distribution among developed and developing countries. For this purpose, the Gini coefficient is used as the indicator of income distribution and the institutional quality index which was formed with the help of the International Country Risk Guide, is used as the indicator of institutional structure in models. The annual data covers 1988-2014 period that is used and recently developed panel data estimators such as CCEMG and System GMM are employed in this study. The findings obtained in the empirical analysis section can be listed as follows: i) An increase in institutional quality affects the Gini coefficient negatively in developed countries while affects positively in developing countries. ii) An increase in the financial development index affects the Gini coefficient positively in developed countries while affects negatively in developing countries. iii) An increase in real income per capita affects the Gini coefficient negatively in both developed and developing countries.