[go: up one dir, main page]
IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/zbw/ifweej/201228.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Country inequality rankings and conversion schemes

Author

Listed:
  • Schröder, Carsten
  • Bönke, Timm
Abstract
Two conversion schemes may be employed for assessing income inequality from household equivalent incomes: to weight household units by size or by needs. Using data from the Luxembourg Income Study, we show the sensitivity of country inequality rankings to conversion schemes and explain the finding by means of inequality decomposition. A bootstrap approach is implemented to test for statistical significance of our results.

Suggested Citation

  • Schröder, Carsten & Bönke, Timm, 2012. "Country inequality rankings and conversion schemes," Economics - The Open-Access, Open-Assessment E-Journal (2007-2020), Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel), vol. 6, pages 1-43.
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:ifweej:201228
    DOI: 10.5018/economics-ejournal.ja.2012-28
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.5018/economics-ejournal.ja.2012-28
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/60222/1/720190371.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.5018/economics-ejournal.ja.2012-28?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Koulovatianos, Christos & Schroder, Carsten & Schmidt, Ulrich, 2005. "On the income dependence of equivalence scales," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 89(5-6), pages 967-996, June.
    2. Bruno, Michael & Habib, Jack, 1976. "Taxes, family grants and redistribution," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 5(1-2), pages 57-79.
    3. Kapteyn, Arie & Van Praag, Bernard, 1978. "A new approach to the construction of family equivalence scales," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 7(4), pages 313-335, May.
    4. Timothy Smeeding & Gunther Schmaus & Brigitte Buhmann & Lee Rainwater, 1988. "Equivalence Scales, Well-Being, Inequality and Poverty: Sensitivity Estimates Across Ten Countries Using the LIS Database," LIS Working papers 17, LIS Cross-National Data Center in Luxembourg.
    5. Richard V. Burkhauser & Timothy M. Smeeding & Joachim Merz, 1996. "Relative Inequality And Poverty In Germany And The United States Using Alternative Equivalence Scales," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 42(4), pages 381-400, December.
    6. Cowell, F.A., 2000. "Measurement of inequality," Handbook of Income Distribution, in: A.B. Atkinson & F. Bourguignon (ed.), Handbook of Income Distribution, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 2, pages 87-166, Elsevier.
    7. Diane Colasanto & Arie Kapteyn & Jacques van der Gaag, 1984. "Two Subjective Definitions of Poverty: Results from the Wisconsin Basic Needs Study," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 19(1), pages 127-138.
    8. Udo Ebert & Patrick Moyes, 2003. "Equivalence Scales Reconsidered," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 71(1), pages 319-343, January.
    9. Browning, Martin, 1992. "Children and Household Economic Behavior," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 30(3), pages 1434-1475, September.
    10. Koulovatianos, Christos & Schrder, Carsten & Schmidt, Ulrich, 2009. "Nonmarket Household Time and the Cost of Children," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 27, pages 42-51.
    11. Donaldson, David & Pendakur, Krishna, 2006. "The Identification of Fixed Costs From Consumer Behavior," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 24, pages 255-265, July.
    12. Anderson, Gordon & Crawford, Ian & Leicester, Andrew, 2011. "Welfare rankings from multivariate data, a nonparametric approach," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 95(3), pages 247-252.
    13. Muellbauer, John, 1980. "The Estimation of the Prais-Houthakker Model of Equivalence Scales," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 48(1), pages 153-176, January.
    14. Daniel T. Slesnick, 1998. "Empirical Approaches to the Measurement of Welfare," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 36(4), pages 2108-2165, December.
    15. George Athanasopoulos & Farshid Vahid, 2003. "Statistical Inference and Changes in Income Inequality in Australia," The Economic Record, The Economic Society of Australia, vol. 79(247), pages 412-424, December.
    16. Timm Bönke & Carsten Schröder & Katharina Schulte, 2010. "Incomes and Inequality in the Long Run: The Case of German Elderly," German Economic Review, Verein für Socialpolitik, vol. 11(4), pages 487-510, November.
    17. Dickens, Richard & Fry, Vanessa & Pashardes, Panos, 1993. "Non-linearities and Equivalence Scales," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 103(417), pages 359-368, March.
    18. Van Praag, Bernard, 1971. "The welfare function of income in Belgium: An empirical investigation," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 11(3), pages 337-369.
    19. Podder, Nripesh & Chatterjee, Srikanta, 2002. "Sharing the national cake in post reform New Zealand: income inequality trends in terms of income sources," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 86(1), pages 1-27, October.
    20. Danziger, Sheldon, et al, 1984. "The Direct Measurement of Welfare Levels: How Much Does It Cost to Make Ends Meet?," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 66(3), pages 500-505, August.
    21. Pollak, Robert A., 1989. "The Theory of the Cost-of-Living Index," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780195058703.
    22. repec:bla:revinw:v:44:y:1998:i:4:p:565-69 is not listed on IDEAS
    23. Sendhil Mullainathan & Marianne Bertrand, 2001. "Do People Mean What They Say? Implications for Subjective Survey Data," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 91(2), pages 67-72, May.
    24. Donaldson, David & Pendakur, Krishna, 2004. "Equivalent-expenditure functions and expenditure-dependent equivalence scales," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(1-2), pages 175-208, January.
    25. Biewen, Martin, 2002. "Bootstrap inference for inequality, mobility and poverty measurement," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 108(2), pages 317-342, June.
    26. Lewbel, Arthur, 1989. "Household equivalence scales and welfare comparisons," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 39(3), pages 377-391, August.
    27. Coulter, Fiona A E & Cowell, Frank A & Jenkins, Stephen P, 1992. "Equivalence Scale Relativities and the Extent of Inequality and Poverty," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 102(414), pages 1067-1082, September.
    28. Udo Ebert, 1999. "Using equivalent income of equivalent adults to rank income distributions," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 16(2), pages 233-258.
    29. repec:bla:revinw:v:34:y:1988:i:2:p:115-42 is not listed on IDEAS
    30. Rolf Aaberge & Ingrid Melby, 1998. "The Sensitivity Of Income Inequality To Choice Of Equivalence Scales," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 44(4), pages 565-569, December.
    31. Ferrer-i-Carbonell, Ada, 2005. "Income and well-being: an empirical analysis of the comparison income effect," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 89(5-6), pages 997-1019, June.
    32. Nelson, Julie A, 1993. "Household Equivalence Scales: Theory versus Policy?," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 11(3), pages 471-493, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Timm Bönke & Carsten Schröder, 2014. "European-Wide Inequality in Times of the Financial Crisis," Journal of Income Distribution, Ad libros publications inc., vol. 23(3), pages 7-34, November.
    2. Karoly, Lynn & Schröder, Carsten, 2015. "Fast methods for jackknifing inequality indices," Applied Econometrics, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (RANEPA), vol. 37(1), pages 125-138.
    3. Peter Grösche & Carsten Schröder, 2014. "On the redistributive effects of Germany’s feed-in tariff," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 46(4), pages 1339-1383, June.
    4. Richard Ochmann, 2010. "Distributional and Welfare Effects of Germany's Year 2000 Tax Reform," Discussion Papers of DIW Berlin 1083, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    5. Bach, Stefan & Beznoska, Martin & Steiner, Viktor, 2016. "Wer trägt die Steuerlast? Verteilungswirkungen des deutschen Steuer- und Transfersystems," Study / edition der Hans-Böckler-Stiftung, Hans-Böckler-Stiftung, Düsseldorf, volume 127, number 347, March.
    6. Timm Bönke & Carsten Schröder & Katharina Schulte, 2011. "Zur Entwicklung der Einkommensverteilung unter älteren Menschen in Deutschland seit der Wiedervereinigung," Vierteljahrshefte zur Wirtschaftsforschung / Quarterly Journal of Economic Research, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research, vol. 80(2), pages 81-99.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Christian Dudel & Jan Marvin Garbuszus & Notburga Ott & Martin Werding, 2015. "Income Dependent Equivalence Scales, Inequality, and Poverty," CESifo Working Paper Series 5568, CESifo.
    2. Timm B nke & Carsten Schr der, 2007. "Inequality and welfare estimates using two alternative weighting schemes," LIS Working papers 463, LIS Cross-National Data Center in Luxembourg.
    3. Christos Koulovatianos & Carsten Schröder, 2023. "Income-dependent equivalence scales and choice theory: implications for poverty measurement," Chapters, in: Jacques Silber (ed.), Research Handbook on Measuring Poverty and Deprivation, chapter 4, pages 39-49, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    4. Melanie Borah & Carina Keldenich & Andreas Knabe, 2019. "Reference Income Effects in the Determination of Equivalence Scales Using Income Satisfaction Data," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 65(4), pages 736-770, December.
    5. Martin Biewen & Andos Juhasz, 2017. "Direct Estimation of Equivalence Scales and More Evidence on Independence of Base," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 79(5), pages 875-905, October.
    6. Udo Ebert & Patrick Moyes, 2009. "Household decisions and equivalence scales," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 22(4), pages 1039-1062, October.
    7. Jan Marvin Garbuszus & Notburga Ott & Sebastian Pehle & Martin Werding, 2021. "Income-dependent equivalence scales: A fresh look at German micro-data," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 19(4), pages 855-873, December.
    8. Koulovatianos, Christos & Schröder, Carsten & Schmidt, Ulrich, 2010. "Confronting the representative consumer with household-size heterogeneity," Kiel Working Papers 1663, Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel).
    9. Bönke, Timm & Schröder, Carsten, 2007. "Equivalence scales reconsidered: an empirical investigation," Economics Working Papers 2007-31, Christian-Albrechts-University of Kiel, Department of Economics.
    10. Aline Bütikofer, 2012. "Semiparametric Base-Independent Equivalence Scales and the Cost of Children in Switzerland," Swiss Journal of Economics and Statistics (SJES), Swiss Society of Economics and Statistics (SSES), vol. 148(I), pages 1-35, March.
    11. Christian Dudel & Jan Marvin Garbuszus & Julian Schmied, 2021. "Assessing differences in household needs: a comparison of approaches for the estimation of equivalence scales using German expenditure data," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 60(4), pages 1629-1659, April.
    12. Fabrizio Balli, 2012. "Are Traditional Equivalence Scales Still Useful? A Review and A Possible Answer," Department of Economics University of Siena 656, Department of Economics, University of Siena.
    13. Udo Ebert & Patrick Moyes, 2017. "Inequality and isoelastic equivalence scales: restrictions and implications," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 48(2), pages 295-326, February.
    14. Bönke Timm & Schröder Carsten, 2011. "Poverty in Germany – Statistical Inference and Decomposition," Journal of Economics and Statistics (Jahrbuecher fuer Nationaloekonomie und Statistik), De Gruyter, vol. 231(2), pages 178-209, April.
    15. de Ree, Joppe & Alessie, Rob & Pradhan, Menno, 2013. "The price and utility dependence of equivalence scales: Evidence from Indonesia," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 97(C), pages 272-281.
    16. Melanie Borah & Andreas Knabe & Kevin Pahlke, 2021. "Parental time restrictions and the cost of children: insights from a survey among mothers," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 19(1), pages 73-95, March.
    17. Stanislaw Maciej Kot, 2023. "Equivalence scales for continuous distributions of expenditure," Equilibrium. Quarterly Journal of Economics and Economic Policy, Institute of Economic Research, vol. 18(1), pages 185-218, March.
    18. Sunil Kumar & Renuka Mahadevan, 2008. "Construction of An Adult Equivalence Index to Measure Intra-household Inequality and Poverty: Case Study," Discussion Papers Series 363, School of Economics, University of Queensland, Australia.
    19. Christos Koulovatianos & Carsten Schröder & Ulrich Schmidt, 2008. "Confronting the Robinson Crusoe paradigm with household-size heterogeneity," Levine's Working Paper Archive 122247000000002324, David K. Levine.
    20. Koulovatianos, Christos & Schröder, Carsten & Schmidt, Ulrich, 2019. "Do demographics prevent consumption aggregates from reflecting micro-level preferences?," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 111(C), pages 166-190.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    inequality; equivalence scale; equivalent income; weighting; heterogeneous distribution; quasi-homogeneous distribution; inequality decomposition;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D31 - Microeconomics - - Distribution - - - Personal Income and Wealth Distribution
    • D63 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics - - - Equity, Justice, Inequality, and Other Normative Criteria and Measurement
    • I32 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - Measurement and Analysis of Poverty

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:zbw:ifweej:201228. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/iwkiede.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.