IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/revinw/v56y2010i1p23-46.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Poles Apart? An Analysis Of The Meaning Of Polarization

Author

Listed:
  • Yoram Amiel
  • Frank Cowell
  • Xavier Ramos

Abstract

Starting from the axiomatization of polarization contained in Esteban and Ray (1994) and Chakravarty and Majumder (2001), we investigate whether people's perceptions of income polarization are consistent with the key axioms. This is carried out using a questionnaire–experimental approach that combines both paper questionnaires and on‐line interactive techniques. The responses suggest that important axioms which serve to differentiate polarization from inequality—e.g. increased bipolarization—as well as other distinctive features of polarization, i.e. the non‐monotonous behavior attributed to polarization, are not widely accepted.

Suggested Citation

  • Yoram Amiel & Frank Cowell & Xavier Ramos, 2010. "Poles Apart? An Analysis Of The Meaning Of Polarization," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 56(1), pages 23-46, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:revinw:v:56:y:2010:i:1:p:23-46
    DOI: 10.1111/j.1475-4991.2009.00361.x
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1475-4991.2009.00361.x
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/j.1475-4991.2009.00361.x?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
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Joan Esteban & Carlos Gradín & Debraj Ray, 2007. "An Extension of a Measure of Polarization, with an application to the income distribution of five OECD countries," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 5(1), pages 1-19, April.
    2. Bossert, Walter & Pfingsten, Andreas, 1990. "Intermediate inequality: concepts, indices, and welfare implications," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 19(2), pages 117-134, April.
    3. Esteban, Joan & Ray, Debraj, 1994. "On the Measurement of Polarization," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 62(4), pages 819-851, July.
    4. Michael C. Wolfson, 1997. "Divergent Inequalities: Theory And Empirical Results," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 43(4), pages 401-421, December.
    5. Wolfson, Michael C, 1994. "When Inequalities Diverge," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 84(2), pages 353-358, May.
    6. Wolfson, Michael, 1997. "Divergent Inequalities - Theory and Empirical Results (Revised Edition)," Analytical Studies Branch Research Paper Series 1997066e, Statistics Canada, Analytical Studies Branch.
    7. Satya R. Chakravarty & Amita Majumder, 2001. "Inequality, Polarisation and Welfare: Theory and Applications," Australian Economic Papers, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 40(1), pages 1-13, March.
    8. You‐Qiang Wang & Kai‐Yuen Tsui, 2000. "Polarization Orderings and New Classes of Polarization Indices," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 2(3), pages 349-363, July.
    9. repec:bla:jpbect:v:2:y:2000:i:3:p:349-63 is not listed on IDEAS
    10. Amiel, Yoram & Cowell, Frank A., 1992. "Measurement of income inequality : Experimental test by questionnaire," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(1), pages 3-26, February.
    11. repec:bla:revinw:v:43:y:1997:i:4:p:401-21 is not listed on IDEAS
    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. Chakravarty, Satya R. & Sarkar, Palash, 2022. "A synthesis of local and effective tax progressivity measurement," MPRA Paper 115180, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    2. Chiara Gigliarano & Pietro Muliere, 2012. "Measuring Income Polarization Using an Enlarged Middle Class," Working Papers 271, ECINEQ, Society for the Study of Economic Inequality.

    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. Yoram Amiel & Frank A Cowell & Xavier Ramos, 2007. "On the Measurement of Polarisation:A questionnaire study," STICERD - Distributional Analysis Research Programme Papers 90, Suntory and Toyota International Centres for Economics and Related Disciplines, LSE.
    2. Satya R. Chakravarty & Conchita D'Ambrosio, 2010. "Polarization Orderings Of Income Distributions," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 56(1), pages 47-64, March.
    3. Chiara Assunta Ricci & Sergio Scicchitano, 2021. "Decomposing changes in income polarization by population group: what happened during the crisis?," Economia Politica: Journal of Analytical and Institutional Economics, Springer;Fondazione Edison, vol. 38(1), pages 235-259, April.
    4. Satya R. Chakravarty & Amita Majumder & Sonali Roy, 2007. "A Treatment Of Absolute Indices Of Polarization," The Japanese Economic Review, Japanese Economic Association, vol. 58(2), pages 273-293, June.
    5. Satya Chakravarty & Bhargav Maharaj, 2012. "Ethnic polarization orderings and indices," Journal of Economic Interaction and Coordination, Springer;Society for Economic Science with Heterogeneous Interacting Agents, vol. 7(1), pages 99-123, May.
    6. Walter Bossert & William Schworm, 2008. "A Class of Two‐Group Polarization Measures," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 10(6), pages 1169-1187, December.
    7. F. Clementi & A. L. Dabalen & V. Molini & F. Schettino, 2017. "When the Centre Cannot Hold: Patterns of Polarization in Nigeria," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 63(4), pages 608-632, December.
    8. Marta Pascual & David Cantarero & Paloma Lanza, 2018. "Health polarization and inequalities across Europe: an empirical approach," The European Journal of Health Economics, Springer;Deutsche Gesellschaft für Gesundheitsökonomie (DGGÖ), vol. 19(8), pages 1039-1051, November.
    9. Fuad Aleskerov & Victoria Oleynik, 2016. "Multidimensional Polarization Index and its Application to an Analysis of the Russian State Duma," Papers 1608.01351, arXiv.org.
    10. Chiara Gigliarano & Daniel Nowak & Karl Mosler, 2019. "A Polarization Index for Overlapping Groups," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 65(4), pages 712-735, December.
    11. Iñaki Permanyer, 2012. "The conceptualization and measurement of social polarization," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 10(1), pages 45-74, March.
    12. Fabio Clementi & Francesco Schettino, 2013. "Income polarization in Brazil, 2001-2011: A distributional analysis using PNAD data," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 33(3), pages 1796-1815.
    13. Joan Esteban & Debraj Ray, 2005. "A Comparison of Polarization Measures," Working Papers 310, Barcelona School of Economics.
    14. Carlos Gradín & Máximo Rossi, 2006. "Income Distribution and Income Sources in Uruguay," Journal of Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 9(1), pages 49-69, May.
    15. Schettino, Francesco & Khan, Haider A., 2020. "Income polarization in the USA: What happened to the middle class in the last few decades?," Structural Change and Economic Dynamics, Elsevier, vol. 53(C), pages 149-161.
    16. Jean-Yves Duclos & Joan Esteban & Debraj Ray, 2004. "Polarization: Concepts, Measurement, Estimation," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 72(6), pages 1737-1772, November.
    17. Ma Casilda Lasso de la Vega & Ana Urrutia & Henar Díez, 2010. "Unit Consistency And Bipolarization Of Income Distributions," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 56(1), pages 65-83, March.
    18. Juan Gabriel Rodríguez, 2015. "A Class of Social Welfare Functions That Depend on Mean Income and Income Polarization," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 61(3), pages 422-439, September.
    19. Iñaki Permanyer, 2008. "The Measurement of Social Polarization in a Multi-group Context," UFAE and IAE Working Papers 736.08, Unitat de Fonaments de l'Anàlisi Econòmica (UAB) and Institut d'Anàlisi Econòmica (CSIC).
    20. Chiara Gigliarano & Karl Mosler, 2009. "Constructing indices of multivariate polarization," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 7(4), pages 435-460, December.

    More about this item

    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:bla:revinw:v:56:y:2010:i:1:p:23-46. 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: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/iariwea.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.