 Now, the presentation I'm giving today is joined with Ines and Vincenzo Samucci who has been working with us on this particular paper. The paper both fits into the unequal context of sort of trying to just basically come up with some relatively, I would say straightforward, quite descriptive, but it's just sort of trying to say what can you say and what can you say based on what's out there. And part of it is actually somewhat motivated by something that has bothered me for quite some time. And this was very much part of the work when I was in Union wider. I mean, we were sort of in this situation that we were sort of saying, well, global inequality is going down and unrest. Another UN agency was saying, no, no, no global inequality is going up. And I kind of, yeah, so that sort of got us going on trying to be more careful. And this is really just meant as a careful descriptive presentation of what we can say and what we can't say based on available data, including the massive work that Carlos has done on the way. I should also just say that it also reflects a request from the handbook of labor, human resources and a population that wanted this type of work done. So we thought we would pursue it. It's a study supported as Rachel has already indicated by an NF. And I'm going to try to just introduce, and then I'm going to try to say something about trends in poverty and equality and growth. And then I'll say a little bit about implications for policy responses, but I'm actually very much hoping that that that can be a topic for our discussion round. And there will also be the plenary later on today, which would sort of speak directly to this. Okay, poverty and inequality and promoting the inclusion of growth of fundamental achieving the SDGs. And we know that much has changed in the global economy in recent decades. So it's really important that one sort of understands that perspectives vary a lot. And I already just mentioned these two U.N. agencies are supposed to be sort of almost like a brother and a sister, saying different things, right? So, and of course, this is highlighted by the fact that we've now had the COVID crisis, which has then also led to some quite strong differences in statements about how people see the impact of the crisis. So we thought that, okay, let's try to just come up with this, what can we say about trends? And it's really just to try to put out the stylized facts. And I would just give a few summary indications, but I'll refer you to the paper for all of the sort of more background about, okay, which are the concepts, how have we defined them and so on. The first sort of insight that jumps to one's mind when one goes through this is that the world is really more heterogeneous than we often kind of pretend in the public debates. And it's really important that we keep that in mind because it does mean that many of the generalizations that people come up with in effect can be terribly wrong when you are in more specific circumstances. So that's sort of one thing that one should keep in mind. And another dimension of this is that the portrait of reality that one ends up with depends heavily on the conceptual measurement issues. I mean, the conceptual one, for example, has already been referred to in terms of this relative absolute. And I was actually stunned when we sort of tried to go through that literature. And so that there was nobody who was looking at nobody that's exaggerating a bit, but actually very, very few took the absolute approach to trying to analyze this and this is said by somebody who did his master's thesis a long time ago, and so I mean, the sort of issues are well, I mean, the number of people choices of colors that you're using and so this is the first thing where we think we can say something about some kind of reasonable merit. It's pretty clear that the poverty rate has been going down quite systematically quite some time, except that in the acting context, quite often has gone down. But at the same time, when we look at the number of people, then that is actually not shown the same improvement. Certainly not when you look at the substantive action. So that's something to keep in mind. You need to look at both shares rates and actually numbers to try to kind of understand what's going on. And that's kind of what does stand out. But this is the balance in the fact that we can allow ourselves to use. Now, it's probably very clear that while we can say that there has been a lot of progress in the world, it is very clear that China the only count two thirds of the reduction in poverty rate for 1980s. So what that means is that a way to say to look at the data as well, not to kind of miss that things might actually be very heterogeneous as I've mentioned. The sort of progress you've seen in China or Vietnam for that matter is very different from what we see in the case of Africa. The decreasing numbers of absolute poor rate of $1.9, except that it is accompanied by increasing numbers according to the living standards of the country where they live. So even if we have seen the poverty rate going down, the numbers of poor according to the living standards where they live in the country they live have to go now. So that again is something that one should really keep in mind when one is discussing that our things don't. And while data remains scarce, it's pretty clear that the COVID-19 pandemic and the consequence of economic recession have had a dramatic impact on the poverty reduction globally. There's been an increase in the global poverty rate in recent years, in the last three years. And this has been, we'll try to go into this in some separate words where you saw the situation in the last three years, but David was here yesterday. And there are also sort of discussions around what might have happened to any quality. But I mean, what I think I want to need to say here is that even if the global relative inequality method by the genie had turned it down for several decades, this would lead only to some extent the variability in regional trends. And we have sessions here already which have shown how variable developments are between the different reasons. And then further one insight is that wealth is far more unequally distributed than income. And that again, when you listen to the debates and the public discussions around, sometimes people don't even distinguish between income and wealth and so on. Again, here there's something to really keep in mind. When we're talking about measurement of inequality, great care is obviously needed when you're making statements about what has happened. And this is in line with a paper that I use in practically all of the sort of presentation of this type of work that I'm referring to. Namely a paper by Martin Rabalian, which first came out as a wider working paper, and it's now in a book that I'll show you at the end. It's probably the best paper along sort of these lines of saying how careful you need to be when you are making statements. And he really traces this literature in an absolutely incredibly clear way. I made reference to the declining global inequality when you're using the most widely relative measures in recent decades, and that is driven by falling between continental inequality and within continental inequality is either constant or slightly increasing. And you can see that in this graph here, where we have very much also drawn on Carlos's work with a bid. But this is sort of based on a relatively careful going through the data and showing that this is actually the sort of picture. However, when globally inequality is measured in absolute terms, then you see a highly dramatic increase stand out. I mean, the red line is pretty clear, right? So one needs to be again here very, very careful in terms of what it is that you're actually trying to show or trying to discuss. And this obviously has also implications for thinking about policy. What is it that you want to achieve? And I mean, one sort of reason why I'm particularly interested in this is also because this is sitting at the very sort of core of why economists and anthropologists often can't speak with each other. I mean, I was first confronted with this very, very starkly in the case of Vietnam. Because my anthropologist friends, they basically insisted that we as economists, we were getting developments in Vietnam wrong. I mean, and this was very much related to this relative absolute in all kinds of things where they would take a very absolute type approach. So if there was still a little bit of gender inequality in some place, things were wrong. And I sort of, of course, I understand that at some level. But when we were thinking about gender inequality and the measures we would typically use, we would see improvements. Now, I should say that there are many hypotheses about the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on inequality. And I want to say that assessments are very reflecting the distinct lack of hard data. So here is a warning, at least the way I see it is that you will see a lot of people arguing very strongly that this is the way it has gone. But actually, and we have tried to sift very, very carefully through. And yeah, I mean, the pandemic probably led to some increase in relative inequality and a decrease in absolute inequality. But you really need to be very careful here. And Angus Deaton is out trying to say you actually need to be careful here also because China, how China sort of plays into this could actually be outweighing it. I mean, in the same way as where we've seen progress. This has, for example, been accompanied by increasing, sorry, increasing poverty in absolute terms that when you sort of go in reverse, it should be the opposite. That's basically his argument. But I hear, I just want to sort of say that the jury is still out. And this has to do with the fact that, well, who were really hardest hit? Well, I mean, in absolute terms, maybe it was the richest or the higher groups in urban centers because they lost most in absolute terms. But was it more in relative terms? Well, you know, and maybe some of the rural areas were not quite as much hard hit in absolute terms. But maybe it led to them falling below the poverty line because they're sort of close to the poverty line. Now they end up being poor. So there are still many unresolved questions here. But what I think we should definitely keep in mind is that the COVID-19 impact on growth and the dynamic and medium to longer term effects on poverty and inequality. I mean, here we can definitely put forward ideas about that this is probably having negative impacts because the poor and the vulnerable members in society are the ones who cannot really bear much pressure down. So even if it's not so much, and even if some of our economic analysis suggests that they may not have lost as much in relative terms as the rich, then they might actually end up being trapped. And then there are longer term consequences. In terms of trends in growth. Well, I just sort of say here that the analysis of relative and absolute growth in sensitive curves and the effect on economic growth and global inequality distribution. I mean, it's clear that the elephant chart, which is sort of, I mean, by now sort of a standard in this literature, it's very clear that the very top of the global income distribution gained significantly from economic growth between 1988 and 2008. I mean, that's sort of the curve that sort of hits the X-axis at around the 80th person time, showing that they had had very little growth in their income, whereas the, what do you call it, in English, the elephant's nose trunk, the elephant's trunk is really going up very much, right? Showing that they are the ones who really had the highest growth rate. Ravallian looked at this, and this is where in these types of questions is really very often advisable to take a look at Ravallian's work, because then he comes on to say, yeah, yeah, sure, there's an elephant. If you choose a particular way of looking at it, particular concepts and so on, if you actually take an absolute perspective. Yeah, it's very clear that the very richest person sides of the income distribution gained enormously, and that the poor and the middle class in development countries actually gained very little, but when you then look at it in absolute terms, then the shape of the animal changes completely and it becomes a serpentile instead. And again here, it's sort of to bring home this point, be very specific and very clear in terms of the types of concepts that you're using when you are discussing what is happening. Now, Karnas has been working on updating this and what seems sort of clear is that the serpent continues to emerge while the elephant pattern is kind of more fading in terms of the more recent data. But yeah. So what are the implications for policy responses? I mean, so why the links between poverty and equality and growth are conflict, sorry, complex. The available estimates sort of agree in a short time that the COVID-19 shock reversed, I mean, very significantly reversed a lot of the progress in terms of fighting poverty, and that obviously will make the achievement of the STDs very, very difficult. It's not wrong to say now that we are not going to get anywhere near achieving the STD-1. I mean, and it's something that probably already should now start being said more loudly in terms of what's happening in the policy debates. So social protection policies, they are obviously for these reasons getting into the center of a lot of our policy debates because we've seen this massive shock. So, I mean, it's clear that this sort of jumps into one's head right away. Well, you need to do something, but obviously it's clear that many governments are very constrained in these areas. I mean, I myself have been working in the most ambiguous context where the capacity of the government to actually pursue these types of social protection policies is extremely constrained. I mean, just getting the job done is not something you don't just push a button, and that needs to be thought about. But at the same time, there clearly is a need to be aware that the labor market is the key way in which income for the poor develops. I mean, what is the capital that the poor has? Well, I mean, it's the labor capability. So that is absolutely critical in thinking about this when we discuss policy. I have one added comment here, which is just that I am hoping that the same awareness will also develop in relation to support food production and the protection of food supply chains. And I should say this was written before the Ukraine crisis hit in. But I mean, this is a recurring theme that lots of those who participate in these debates, they tend to forget agriculture, food, food supply chains, etc., when we are talking about these topics in policy circles. And then it's very clear that the restrictions imposed during the pandemic have highlighted once more the need to build resilience among the poor and vulnerable. I mean, it really stands out as something that is so incredibly central to what we need to do also with the view to the future. Now, this is developed a lot more in this book, which I made reference to in the beginning. Quite a few of the stylized facts are also reflected in this book. Thank you very much for your attention.