This paper introduces a theory-based equivalence scale for public in-kind transfers, which justifies comparison of distributions of extended income (cash income plus the value of public services) between European countries. We demonstrate the usefulness of the proposed equivalence scale in an...

Tony Atkinson is universally celebrated for his outstanding contributions to the measurement and analysis of inequality, but he never saw the study of inequality as a separate branch of economics. He was an economist in the classical sense, rejecting any sub-field labelling of his interests and...

This paper compares income inequality and income mobility in the Scandinavian countries and the United States during 1980-90. The results suggest that inequality is greater in the United States than in the Scandinavian countries and that this inequality ranking of countries remains unchanged...

During the last two decades, the discrete-choice modelling of labour supply decisions has become increasingly popular, starting with Aaberge et al. (1995) and van Soest (1995). Within the literature adopting this approach there are however two potentially important issues that are worthwhile...

This paper is concerned with the problem of ranking Lorenz curves in situations where the Lorenz curves intersect and no unambiguous ranking can be attained without introducing weaker ranking criteria than first-degree Lorenz dominance. To deal with such situations two alternative sequences of...

The purpose of this paper is to propose and justify the use of a few measures of inequality for summarizing the basic information provided by the Lorenz curve. By exploiting the fact that the Lorenz curve can be considered analogous to a cumulative distribution function it is demonstrated that...

Despite macroeconomic evidence pointing to a negative aggregate consumption response due to political uncertainty, few papers have used microeconomic panel data to analyze how households adjust their consumption after an uncertainty shock. We study household savings and expenditure adjustment...

This paper analyzes to what extent the rise in women's labor force participation has led to 'flocking together', i.e. whether women with high labor income tend to be married to men with high labor income, or vice versa. Based on the decomposition of the Gini coefficient and a related index for...

The purpose of this Working Paper is to study the impact of including the value of public health care, long-term care, education and childcare on estimates of income inequality and financial poverty in 23 European countries. The valuation of public services and the identification of target...