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Decomposition of the Gini Coefficient by Income Components: Various Types of Applications and Interpretations

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Abstract

This paper aims at clarifying the notion "overall distributive effect" of an income component or a policy proposal and moreover discusses various approaches for assessing the distributional impact of the components of total income. We pay particular attention to the problem of evaluating the distributional consequences of including a new income component in the statistical income base. Our example is the value of unpaid household work, which statistically is new to the income base, although conceptually it is included in extended income or full income, so that individual time allocations are already reflected in data. In contrast, introducing a genuinely new income component (e.g. a new transfer payment) will lead to behavioral responses that should be accounted for in the distributional analysis. However, it is standard practice to ignore behavioral responses in official analyses of tax and benefit reforms (e.g.a new transfer payment) and to compare the Gini coefficients with and without the new income component given unchanged behavior. Rather than solely comparing the levels of the Gini coefficients we suggest that one should compare the decompositions of the Gini coefficients with and without the new income component. This result gives a clarification of the difference between contribution to inequality and (marginal) effect on inequality.

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  • Rolf Aaberge & Iulie Aslaksen, 1996. "Decomposition of the Gini Coefficient by Income Components: Various Types of Applications and Interpretations," Discussion Papers 182, Statistics Norway, Research Department.
  • Handle: RePEc:ssb:dispap:182
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    File URL: https://www.ssb.no/a/publikasjoner/pdf/DP/dp_182.pdf
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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Kenneth Nelson, 2004. "Mechanisms of Poverty Alleviation," LIS Working papers 372, LIS Cross-National Data Center in Luxembourg.
    2. Rolf Aaberge & Tom Wennemo & Anders Bjorklund & Markus Jantti & Peder J. Pedersen & Nina Smith, 2000. "Unemployment Shocks and Income Distribution: How did the Nordic Countries Fare during their Crises?," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 102(1), pages 77-99, March.
    3. Mary Keeney, 2000. "The Distributional Impact of Direct Payments on Irish Farm Incomes," Journal of Agricultural Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 51(2), pages 252-265, May.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Income distribution; Gini coefficient; decomposition; household production.;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D31 - Microeconomics - - Distribution - - - Personal Income and Wealth Distribution
    • D13 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Household Production and Intrahouse Allocation

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