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Inequalities Seminar Series

Tuesdays, 12.30 to 1.30pm

The Inequalities Seminar Series at the International Inequalities Institute is a venue for scholars from LSE and beyond to present their innovative work on social and economic inequality. The seminars are open and free to all.

Upcoming Inequalities Seminars

  • Annalena Oppel headshot

    The rising tide: floods as drivers of income and welfare inequality in South Africa
    Part of the Inequalities Seminar Series

    Tuesday 24 March 2026, 12.30 to 1.30pm. In-person and online seminar. LSE Centre Building 2.04.

    Speakers:
    Dr Annalena Oppel, Research Fellow, Atlantic Fellows for Social and Economic Equity, LSE
    Dr Enrico Nichelatti, Postdoctoral Researcher, Department of Social Sciences, University of Luxembourg

    This paper examines how floods impact inequality in South Africa by linking georeferenced flood data with cross-sectional household and individual data from the National Income Dynamics Study survey. Our findings reveal that floods significantly reduce all income measures for individuals within 0.5 km of flood zones, with substantial spill-over effects extending to 1 km. While South Africa's extensive social grant system provides some cushioning, it is insufficiently shock responsive to prevent welfare declines. Post-fiscal income falls as coverage gaps exclude informal workers, grant values erode due to post-disaster inflation, and indirect taxes continue to burden affected individuals. Floods also reduce individual consumption and increase material deprivation by destroying assets, disrupting markets, and raising the cost of essentials. These effects are particularly severe for low-income individuals in informal settlements, who face disproportionate exposure, limited recovery capacity, and prolonged deprivation.

    Our results demonstrate that floods are not merely environmental shocks but powerful drivers of inequality that interact with South Africa's pre-existing spatial, racial, and economic disparities. The findings underscore the need for shock-responsive social protection, resilient infrastructure investment, and equitable climate adaptation policiesto prevent floods from further entrenching structural inequality.

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  • Jeanne Bomare profile picture

    Death and taxes: inheritance tax planning and unexpected mortality
    Part of the Inequalities Seminar Series

    Tuesday 31 March 2026, 12.30 to 1.30pm. In-person and online seminar. LSE Marshall Building 2.06.

    Speaker:
    Dr Jeanne Bomare, Research Officer, LSE III

    We use the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic as a natural experiment to identify the scale and mechanisms of inheritance tax planning in the United Kingdom. By providing an exogenous shock to mortality, the pandemic suddenly truncated the time available for anticipatory planning. Linking administrative inheritance tax returns to high-frequency mortality data, we compare the estates of individuals who died unexpectedly during the pandemic with those of observationally similar decedents from pre-pandemic years.

    We find that unexpected deaths are associated with significantly larger reported estates - increasing the average estate by approximately £350,000 - and a 5 percentage point rise in effective tax rates. Our results indicate that inheritance tax planning reduces effective liabilities by at least 55 percent, representing an annual revenue loss of £3-4.5 billion. We show that inter-vivos transfers, rather than within-estate portfolio restructuring, are the primary planning margin. These findings demonstrate that the ‘seven-year rule’ for gifts is a first-order determinant of the effective tax base and suggest that revenue-raising reforms must prioritize the treatment of lifetime transfers.

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Previous Inequalities Seminars