Attitudes to Income Equality: The 'Socialist Legacy' Revisited

• Published in: Comparative economic studies Vol. 51; no. 3; pp. 344 - 366
• Main Authors: Murthi, Mamta, Tiongson, Erwin R
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London Palgrave Macmillan UK 01.09.2009; Palgrave Macmillan; Palgrave Macmillan Ltd. (Springer)
• Series: Comparative Economic Studies
• Subjects: Analysis; Attitudes; Central Asia; Central Eastern Europe; Comparative analysis; Eastern Europe; Economic aspects; Economic Development: Human Resources; Economics; Economics and Finance; Equality; Human Development; I38; Income Distribution; Income inequality; Industry Studies; International Economics; Market economies; Migration O150; P29; Personal Income, Wealth, and Their Distributions D310; Political Economy/Economic Systems; Population P230; Post-communist societies; Preferences; Property Rights P260; Regular Article; Russian Federation; Social justice; Socialism; Socialist Systems and Transitional Economies: Factor and Product Markets; Socialist Systems and Transitional Economies: Political Economy; Studies; Values; United States; Eastern Europe; preferences; income equality; attitudes; P29; transition; I38
• ISSN: 0888-7233; 1478-3320
• DOI: 10.1057/ces.2009.4

It is routinely assumed that residents of post-socialist countries have a preference for greater income equality, other things being equal, owing to the legacy of socialism. This proposition is examined in the context of Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union (FSU) using three waves of the World Values Survey . Contrary to expectations, there is little evidence of a ‘socialist legacy’ en bloc . Countries in the FSU as a group display significantly lower preference for moving towards greater income equality than Eastern Europe. Moreover, this preference for greater income inequality appears to have persisted at least since the mid-1990s.