LAUSR

The theme of the World Bank’s 2006 World Development Report was Equity and Development. This article reviews the origins of the 2006 WDR, and why this was a controversial and political decision. It explains why equity is different from equality. It then considers what the World Bank and other agencies are doing to promote greater equity. Proequity policies require concern about distribution of both wealth and income, and the things that create greater opportunity. These issues are framed in terms of what some economists refer to as the “growth-inequality-poverty triangle.” Resolving some of the contradictions of this triangle—how pro-growth policies and a concern for the distribution of gains does or does not resolve the problem of absolute poverty—explains many of the problems that remain.