Inequality Increases, IMF Sees Improvement
In spite of a dynamic economy, with a 14.6 percent increase in exports, and investments for us$1 billion this year, Costa Rica shows no improvement regarding the level of poverty and social inequality, a team of university researchers disclosed.

“60 percent of the poorest families in this country are losing income, while that of the wealthiest 20 percent is increasing markedly”, warned economist Henry Mora, director of the Circumstance Analysis Project of the state National University (UNA in Spanish).

However, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) considers that the quality of the statistics of Costa Rica has improved in the last few years.

The Fund pointed this out on its last economic report on Costa Rica, issued last November 28.

One of such improvements is the new Consumer Price Index, which the National Statistics and Census Bureau started using last August.

This Index is based on the current trends in family spending, rather than in the ones dating 18 years back, as was the case with the one used until last July.

Improvement was also pointed out in the new handbook dealing with public investment, which substituted one dating back to 1986.