Colombians ask for results. Armed conflict in Colombia and government corruption brought a worst income distribution through 1990 to 2011, therefore colombian government has to work hard to finish both of them. There are about 28.5 million of colombian in poverty according to government social program called Sisbén, it mean 61.9% of total population. Moreover the GINI index shows an increasing trend since the end of 80’s when it reached 0.456 and employees enjoyed the 43.8% of total income. Nowadays the GINI index reached 0.548 and employees just share with 35.8% of total income. Through the end of internal war conflict between government forces and guerrilla, employees can enjoy 2% above of income distribution in the next years as soon conflict finishes. However, there is a big problem still with politicians who are corrupts, this fact worse off income distribution and government appears to ignore it, evidence is politicians who are still out of jail and financial institutions taking employees wealth through high interest rates.
Author: Humberto Bernal,
Economist,
e-mail: zhumber@gmail.com
Income distribution (GINI index) in Colombia through last 36 years shows a worse state in these last 3 years, it showed a value around 0.46 during 80’s and 0.55 in the last 20 years where it reached 0.55 in 2011 as figure 1 shows. This increasing trend can be explained by lacking of fair politics to work for those who earn low wages. Moreover, the armed conflict between government forces and guerrilla make a worst situation, one can easily calculate the impact of internal war conflict and the income distribution, the econometric result under data from 1976 to 2010 is a decrease of 2.0% of employees’s income when homicide rate face a increase of 1 point. This fact can easily supported through figure 1 and figure 2. Figure 1 shows Colombians used to face better quality of live in 80’s but as soon the internal war conflict worst at the beginning of 90’s, then Colombians showed a worst income.
Figure 1. Income distribution Colombia (GINI index) 1976-2011
Figure 2 shows how income (Gross Domestic Product, GDP) is distributed between citizens through 1977 and 2010. Again, income distribution was better through 80’s but after that decade it showed worst results. By 1983 employees from Colombia reached 43.8% of total Colombia income (GDP), this percentage has been the highest in the last 36 years (under statical evidence) but without statistical evidence I can say that it was the highest through XX century and beginning of XXI century. Unfortunately, nowadays employees in Colombia just share 35.8% of total income, what governments we have !!.
Figure 2. Income distribution Colombia
1977-2011
(GDP distribution %)
Colombia is a country that faces huge volume of people in poverty, through official information one can show how many they are. Government works under several indicators to point the number of people in poverty but there are two of them which are the most important. The first one is through Line of Poverty (people who do not have enough money to afford the basic good and services), this indicator point about 15.7 million out of 46 million in Colombia in 2011, it means a percentage of 34.1% as figure 3 shows (blue line). Thought this measure Colombia has showed a decline trend of percentage of poor people into total population. Nevertheless, this indicator called Poverty Line does not work properly, there is other indicator that shows the real number of poor people in Colombia. Colombian government has worked in social program called Sisbén which is designed for poor people, this program gives subsides to people who really need the assistance. The number of people who demand Sisbén’s benefits reached 28.5 millions in 2011 and more than 30 million in 2012 (August). Therefore, if one takes Sisbén information to built a poverty indicator, one can conclude that 61.9% of total population in Colombia face a poverty scenario. Figure 3 shows the percentage of population in poverty in Colombia under this measure (red dashed line).
Figure 3. Population in poverty
(%of total population) 2002-2011
donde conseguiste esos datos?
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