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What Can we Learn from Subjective Data ? The Case of Income and Well-Being

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Author Info
Claudia Senik

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Abstract

How does the income of others affect my own welfare ? This survey of the empirical literature stresses the contribution of subjective data to the understanding of this issue, with an attempt to disentangle direct effects (preferences interdependence) from indirect informational effects. It shows that perceived mobility is central to the link between other people’s income and individual satisfaction, as it determines individual opportunities and risks. Agents also appreciate the equalitarian nature of mobility itself, in which case individual welfare depends on dynamic inequality rather than static income distribution. These studies illustrate how subjective data can bring information on aspects of utility and social interactions that are beyond the scope of the method based on action-revealed preferences.

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Paper provided by DELTA (Ecole normale supérieure) in its series DELTA Working Papers with number 2003-06.

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Date of creation: Mar 2003
Date of revision: Oct 2003
Handle: RePEc:del:abcdef:2003-06

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Cited by:
(explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.)

  1. Claudia Senik, 2005. "Ambition and jealousy. Income interactions in the "Old" Europe versus the "New" Europe and the United States," PSE Working Papers 2005-14, PSE (Ecole normale supérieure), revised Mar 2007. [Downloadable!]
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  2. Javier Herrera & Mireille Razafindrakoto & François Roubaud, 2006. "The determinants of subjective poverty: A comparative analysis in Madagascar and Peru," Working Papers DT/2006/01, DIAL (Développement, Institutions & Analyses de Long terme). [Downloadable!]
  3. Ekaterina Kalugina & Natalia Radtchenko & Catherine Sofer, 2006. "How do spouses share their full income ? Identification of the sharing rule using self-reported income," Cahiers de la Maison des Sciences Economiques bla06012, Université Panthéon-Sorbonne (Paris 1). [Downloadable!]
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  4. Claudia Senik, 2004. "Relativizing relative income," DELTA Working Papers 2004-17, DELTA (Ecole normale supérieure). [Downloadable!]
  5. Elvire Guillaud, 2008. "Preferences for redistribution: a European comparative analysis," PSE Working Papers 2008-41, PSE (Ecole normale supérieure). [Downloadable!]
  6. Claudia Senik, 2007. "Direct Evidence on Income Comparisons and their Welfare Effects," IZA Discussion Papers 3195, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA). [Downloadable!]
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