Abstract

ITURRA, Julio; CASTILLO, Juan Carlos; MALDONADO, Luis  and  RUFS ORELLANA, Catalina Ignacia. Perception of Economic Inequality and its Influence on the Justification of Legitimate Income Differences. Estud. sociol [online]. 2023, vol.41, n.122, pp.309-351.  Epub Oct 13, 2023. ISSN 2448-6442.  https://doi.org/10.24201/es.2023v41n122.2260.

We analyze the effect of information on economic inequality on the justification of wage inequality. Using a survey experiment in a sample of the metropolitan area of Santiago de Chile (n=732), we seek to replicate the results of Kris-Stella Trump (2018) on the justification of wage gaps. The results show that information on real wages does not impact Trump’s measure of inequality justification. Instead, wage inequality information was found to increase the justification of wage gaps by high- and low-status occupations, which was further intensified by joint exposure to system justification. The article ends with a discussion of the study’s methodological limitations and implications for the analysis of distributional preferences.

Keywords : economic inequality; wage gaps; distributive justice; inequality perception; legitimacy of inequality; survey experiment.

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