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GENERATING INTERNATIONALLY COMPARABLE INCOME DISTRIBUTION DATA: EVIDENCE FROM THE FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF GERMANY (1974), MEXICO (1968) AND THE UNITED KINGDOM (1979).
Author(s) -
Ginneken Wouter
Publication year - 1982
Publication title -
review of income and wealth
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.024
H-Index - 57
eISSN - 1475-4991
pISSN - 0034-6586
DOI - 10.1111/j.1475-4991.1982.tb00623.x
Subject(s) - distribution (mathematics) , total personal income , income distribution , unit (ring theory) , economics , household income , per capita income , welfare , demographic economics , income in kind , personal income , per capita , adjusted gross income , net national income , gross income , economic growth , public economics , geography , inequality , demography , sociology , population , market economy , mathematical analysis , mathematics education , mathematics , archaeology , tax reform , state income tax
In this article an attempt is made to generate internationally comparable income distribution data for the Federal Republic of Germany (1974), Mexico (1968) and the United Kingdom (1979). To that end, the same income concept and income unit were adopted for each country, i.e. respectively household available income and the household. Moreover, incomes from various sources were adjusted for inconsistency with National Accounts according to Altimir's methodology. The paper finds that the distribution of persons by household income per equivalent unit is probably the best way of looking at the distribution of economic welfare. It further demonstrates that the distribution of persons by household available income per capita is much closer to this ‘ideal’ distribution than the distribution of households by household available income. Finally, the paper discusses some of the problems arising from the fact that one normally works with grouped data. It is found that in the case of the three countries under study, grouping is likely to have had only a small impact on the results.