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Equivalence Scales and Inequality

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Handbook of Income Inequality Measurement

Part of the book series: Recent Economic Thought Series ((RETH,volume 71))

Abstract

The economic approach to the study of inequality might be caricatured as the comparison of unlike incomes among otherwise similar people. But in practice it is also about the comparison of incomes of unlike persons with unlike circumstances. Except under the most artificial conditions distributional judgments require an appropriate basis for transforming nominal incomes into a “common currency” through which one person’s economic position can be meaningfully measured against another’s; this basis for interpersonal comparison has the potential to be as important as the choice of a particular inequality index in practical applications. In this chapter we review the issues at the center of this problem and the practical problems of implementing the economic principles underlying these issues.

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Authors
  1. Frank A. Cowell
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  2. Magda Mercader-Prats
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Bar-Ilan University, Israel

    Jacques Silber

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© 1999 Springer Science+Business Media New York

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Cowell, F.A., Mercader-Prats, M. (1999). Equivalence Scales and Inequality. In: Silber, J. (eds) Handbook of Income Inequality Measurement. Recent Economic Thought Series, vol 71. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-011-4413-1_15

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-011-4413-1_15

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht

  • Print ISBN: 978-94-010-5897-1

  • Online ISBN: 978-94-011-4413-1

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

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