Request for statistics on Chile

[chavd]

Can anybody help me with statistics on the changes in
income distribution in Chile during and after the *Pinochet reforms*. On
the one hand, I find data on the increase in AVERAGE income, on the
other, I find data showing an increase in POVERTY.
I am a Bulgarian journalist, trying to write an article on the less
known aspects of neo-liberal reforms (privatization, deregulation etc.).
In my country, the information space is flooded with shining examples of
successfull shock therapy but without any attempt to give the whole
story. Chile is the oldest and most persistent case, a pillar of
'market' ideology.
Needless to say many of the readers I write for are wondering how come
they are drinking bitter medicine for a whole decade without feeling any
healing effects. Everything has caved in - consumption by the lower 80%,
market demand even for basic necessities, investment (even in
agriculture, deemed advantageous by the IMF), savings, employment,
school graduation - and our reform-minded elite is telling us that the
GNP and AVERAGE wages are increasing. So now we are experiencing private
ownership of capital, income disparity, no price regulation and
subsidies, almost free trade across borders - and all signs of a deep
depression.
Part of the nice numbers is an artifact of the state National statistics
institute. It started incuding non-monetary *added value services* in
the GNP. Almost all Bulgarians own apartments from socialist times - so
living in your own home is now accounted for as renting a dwelling from
your own self! Critics inside the country know this is idiotic, but
internationally it contibutes to the positive results from the
implementation of structural adjustments with IMF support.
I strongly suspect that Chilean and similar successes in easily
attainable sources are mostly statistics - that is, worse than lies and
damn lies.

Chavdar Naidenov