Cross-country income variations and inclusive financing

Abstract

Purpose

This study, a symposium, aims to explore the determinants of financial inclusion, impact of cross-country income-variations on financial inclusion, do high-income countries really uplift the financial inclusion and does the higher financial inclusion index indicate the larger economy?

Design/methodology/approach

This study adopts the panel data model to investigate the impact of high-income countries and low- and middle-income countries on financial inclusion. However, this study further adopts the principal component analysis rather than Sarma’s approach to calculate the financial inclusion index.

Findings

Based on the Data of World Bank, United Nations, International Monetary Fund, World Development Indicators, this study concludes that there is no nexus between income variations and financial inclusion, as the study reveals that some low- and middle-income countries have greater financial inclusion index such as Thailand (2.8538FII), Brazil (1.9526FII) and Turkey (0.8582FII). In low- and middle-income countries, the gross domestic product per capita, information technology and communication, the rule of law, age dependency ratio and urbanization have a noteworthy impact on financial inclusion that accumulatively describe the 83% of the model. Whereas, in high-income countries, merely, information technology and urbanization have a substantial influence on the growth of financial revolution and financial inclusion that describes the 70% of the total.

Research limitations/implications

The biggest limitation is the availability of data from different countries.

Originality/value

The originality of this paper is its technique, which is used in this paper to calculate the financial inclusion index. Furthermore, this study contributes to 40 different countries based on income, which could help to boost financial inclusion, and ultimately, it leads them toward economic growth.

Citation

Safdar, M.N., Lin, T. and Amin, S. (2021), "Cross-country income variations and inclusive financing", Journal of Financial Economic Policy, Vol. 13 No. 3, pp. 317-336. https://doi.org/10.1108/JFEP-10-2019-0207