830 research outputs found
Consumer’s surplus and the reform of network industries : a primer
No full textStarting from an industry where production is provided by a public
monopolist, we observe the effects of a sequence of reforms within the network industry
on consumer surplus. Using a simple comparative statics framework, we find
the indifference conditions for the consumer surplus under the following regimes:
a public monopoly, an unregulated private monopoly, a regulated private monopoly,
a vertically disintegrated monopoly, a duopoly and a liberalized market. The results
are determined by the relative size of the x-inefficiencies of the public monopolist,
allocative inefficiencies of the private monopoly, the cost of unbundling and the costs related to establishing a competitive marke
The Income Lever and the Allocation of Aid
No full textAbstract: The article develops a concept and a measure of the monetary capacity of a country to reduce its own poverty and shows how these tools can be used to guide budget allocations or the allocation of aid. The authors call this concept the income lever. Making use of tax and distributive theory, the article shows how different redistributive criteria correspond to the different normative criteria of the income lever. It then constructs various income lever indexes based on these criteria and uses such indexes to rank countries according to their own capacity to reduce poverty
Vulnerability to poverty: Empirical findings
No full textPoverty has been always studied in a world of certainty. However, if the aim of studying poverty is not only improving the well-being of whom is deprived today, but also preventing people from becoming poor in the future, a new, forward-looking perspective must be adopted. Since future distributions of outcomes are unknown, analyzing poverty in a world of uncertainty becomes essential. The literature has recently started studying uncertainty as a determinant part of poverty itself, referring to this issue as ‘Vulnerability to poverty’. World Development Report 2000/2001, for instance, underlines that: ‘poverty is more than inadequate income or human development, it is also vulnerability and a lack of voice, power, and representation Reducing vulnerability – to economic shocks, natural disasters, ill health, disability, and personal violence – is an intrinsic part of enhancing well-being’ (World Bank, 2001, p. 12).
Vulnerability is a relatively young stream of the welfare economics literature.
Although the idea of linking the economics of poverty with the economics of uncertainty dates back to the seminal work of Morduch (1994), almost all contributions
were developed in the last decade, and only a few have been published to date in peer-reviewed journals
Individual Diversity and the Gini Decomposition
No full textThe paper defines the Gini index as the sum of individual contributions where individual contributions are interpreted as the degree of diversity of each individual from all other members of society. Among various possible forms of individual contributions to the Gini found in the literature, we show that only one form satisfies a set of desirable properties. This form can be used for decomposing the Gini into population subgroups. An empirical illustration shows the use of this approach
A primer on the welfare effects of regulatory reforms in network industries
No full textStarting from an industry where production is provided by a public monopolist, we look at the effects on the consumers' surplus of a sequence of reforms in network industry. Using a simple comparative statics framework, we find indifference conditions in consumers' surplus between respectively public monopoly, unregulated private monopoly, regulated private monopoly, vertically disintegrated monopoly, duopoly and liberalized market. The results are determined by the relative size of the x-inefficiencies of the public monopolist, allocative inefficiencies of private monopoly, the cost of unbundling and costs related to establishing a competitive marke
The origins of the Gini index: extracts from Variabilità e Mutabilità (1912) by Corrado Gini
No full textThe scope of this paper is to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Gini index by providing the original formulae. Corrado Gini introduced his index for the first time in a 1912 book published in Italian under the name of "Variabilità e Mutabilità" (Variability and Mutability). This article provides selected extracts of Part I of the book dedicated to measures of variability. We find that Gini proposed no less than 13 formulations of his index, none of which is known today to the large public. We also find that Gini anticipated some of the developments that derived from the study of his index. © 2011 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC
Population Changes and the Measurement of Inequality
No full textPopulation changes in countries with little natural growth tend to occur via migration channels and among poorer individuals such as refugees and economic migrants, or richer individuals such as international white collar workers or global entrepreneurs. These migratory flows are increasing in size, they are difficult to capture in censuses and surveys, and they potentially bias the measurement of inequality. This paper provides a formal treatment of the impact of population changes on the measurement of inequality when changes occur to the extremes of an income distribution. It provides the conditions under which inequality is expected to increase or decrease and determines the relative importance of including or excluding selected observations at the top or at the bottom. An application to US data illustrates the mathematical results and shows that including or excluding observations from the extremes can bias the measurement of inequality significantly
An Inter-temporal Relative Deprivation Index
No full textThe paper provides an axiomatic characterization of a new class of relative deprivation indices. Relative deprivation is the feeling that an individual experiences when she compares herself with someone who is better off. We believe that individuals not only take care of their relative position with respect to others but also of their relative position with respect to their own past. Therefore, we introduce a history-regarding reference group, while in the traditional relative deprivation framework the reference group is only other-regarding. The new index is sensitive to the proximity of transfers in the reference groups: an individual may feel more deprived if an increase in achievements occurs close or far to her current position. The new index is illustrated with an application to EU countries
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