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The distributional impacts of an energy boom in Western Canada
Author(s) -
Marchand Joseph
Publication year - 2015
Publication title -
canadian journal of economics/revue canadienne d'économique
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.773
H-Index - 69
eISSN - 1540-5982
pISSN - 0008-4085
DOI - 10.1111/caje.12141
Subject(s) - boom , economics , inequality , poverty , demographic economics , energy poverty , economic geography , econometrics , development economics , economic growth , environmental science , mathematics , environmental engineering , medicine , mathematical analysis , alternative medicine , pathology , panacea (medicine)
In the energy‐rich provinces of Western Canada, inequality rose over the past two decades while poverty declined, raising the question of whether the recent energy boom was a contributing factor. This study uses local labour market variation in energy extraction intensity to identify these distributional impacts. The growth in local outcomes attributable to the boom is found to be U‐shaped and significant across all distributional segments, leading to somewhat increased local inequality aggregates and reduced local poverty. This pattern is preserved but varies across sectors, driving a large local inequality increase in energy extraction, with smaller rises and reductions in other industries.