It is undeniable that foreign direct investments (FDI) are needed by many countries to push their economic growth. However, a trade-off between economic growth and income inequality, particularly in developing countries, frequently occurs. This paper examines the influence of FDI on income inequality in Indonesia. To estimate the relation of both variables, panel data regression model with panel-corrected standard errors (PCSE) technique was used to analyze provincial level data from 33 provinces over the period of 2012-2016. The study finds that FDI has a direct and insignificant effect on income inequality. Moreover, FDI has indirect and negative effects on income inequality, via economic growth. Interestingly, the indirect effects of FDI on income inequality through education and trade are statistically insignificant. In addition, non-linear relation between FDI and income inequality has not been proved.

This study analyse the causality relationship between foreign direct investment (FDI) and economic growth in Indonesia over the period 1970-2015. The method used in this research is Granger causality approach. Results from the estimation show that there is no causal relationship between FDI and economic growth in short and long run. However, the results in this paper indicate that there is a unidirectional causal relationship running from economic growth to FDI in short and long run. It means that economic growth influences FDI inflows in Indonesia.

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Foreign direct investment (FDI) plays an essential role in growing the economy, where this role runs through two things, namely capital accumulation and technology transfer. However, in the literature, previous research findings are still inconclusive to show positive contributions of FDI on economic growth. Furthermore, while the impact of FDI on economic growth has been studied using sectoral data, there has been less research done using data at the provincial and sectoral levels. This study aims to analyze the impact of foreign direct investment (FDI) on economic growth employing sectoral data at the provincial level (33 provinces) in Indonesia over 2010-2019. Based on the fixed effects estimator (reghdfe), our estimation results prove that, in general, FDI significantly positively impacts economic growth in the Indonesian provinces. We also find that FDI in the mining, manufacturing, water, gas and electricity, hotels and restaurants, and real estate sectors has a significant positive effect on economic growth. Meanwhile, only FDI in the agricultural sector has a significant negative impact. Our estimation results confirm that FDI in the manufacturing sector contributes positively and has a considerable impact. The results are robust to the GMM System estimator, which considers the endogeneity problem.