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Regional Income Inequality and Welfare in China: A Dominance Analysis[Note 1. The data utilized in this study were made available ...]
Author(s) -
Bishop John A.,
Formby John P.,
Zheng Buhong
Publication year - 1996
Publication title -
asian economic journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.345
H-Index - 28
eISSN - 1467-8381
pISSN - 1351-3958
DOI - 10.1111/1467-8381.00014
Subject(s) - economics , lorenz curve , dominance (genetics) , stochastic dominance , inequality , welfare , economic inequality , econometrics , income inequality metrics , per capita , household income , income distribution , gini coefficient , demographic economics , geography , mathematics , market economy , mathematical analysis , population , biochemistry , chemistry , demography , archaeology , sociology , gene
Inference‐based dominance analysis is applied to micro data containing comprehensive measures of rural and urban incomes in seven major regions of China. Ordinal inequality rankings are estimated for Lorenz curves of household income, per capita household income and square root equivalences scale adjusted income. Regional inequality is shown to be sensitive to the treatment of household size. The lack of reliable regional cost of living measures leads us to propose that entire food expenditure share quantile distributions be used as indicators of differences in well‐being within and across regions. The results indicate that statistical rankings of Lorenz dominance and food share dominance are very different indicators of regional disparities in income and welfare in China. One urban region is shown to have been in the unenviable position in 1988 of being at the bottom of the Lorenz dominance ranking and tied for last in terms of food share dominance.