While much ink has been spilled over the study of income inequality and economic growth,little attention has been paid to investigate the interaction between these variables of interest in resource-dependent economies. The present paper develops a two-sector small open economy model including two groups of households (the rich and the poor). The mechanismis derived by two forces: 1) a composition of productivity growth with Learning by Doing (LBD) and capital accumulation with absorptive capacity constraints on the supply-side and 2) a change in the aggregate demand of the non-traded goods with a non-homothetic preference on the demand-side. Applying a panel data approach for a sample database of 40 countries over the period 1975-2015, I evaluate the predictions of my theory. The main findings are fourfold. In response to a windfall income, first, the natural resource curse (i.e. the Dutch disease and Deindustrialization) appears. Second, income inequality rises if the non-traded sector is relatively capital-intensive while income inequality falls if the non-traded sector is relatively labor-intensive. Third, income inequality change tends to moderate the natural resource curse. Fourth, natural resource curse and income inequality change seem to be relatively more intensive in a democratic country than in a non-democratic country.