Skip to main content
Knowledge4Policy
Knowledge for policy

Supporting policy with scientific evidence

We mobilise people and resources to create, curate, make sense of and use knowledge to inform policymaking across Europe.

  • Publication | 2020

Globalisation, China and income inequality in Europe

Composite Indicators
Globalisation, China and income inequality in Europe
(@©EC)

Headlines

  • After having decreased during the 1990s, income inequality increased during the 2000s in more than two-thirds of the regions of EU15 countries.
  • The growth of trade pressure from China on EU15 regions started to accelerate rapidly when China joined the WTO in 2001, doubling first by the outbreak of the 2009- 2012 crisis, and once again by its end.
  • The increase of trade pressure had a significant impact on inequality within EU15 regions. As compared with a hypothetical ‘no-accession baseline’, income inequality is about 9% larger in 2011, whereas the estimated impact typically makes up around 40% of the actual increase in inequality observed since 2000.