A growing literature has tried to measure the extent to which individuals have equal opportunities to acquire income. At the same time, policy makers have doubled down on efforts to go beyond income when measuring well- being. We attempt to bridge these two areas by measuring the extent to which...

Inequality of post-tax income among pre-tax equals is evaluated and aggregated to form a global index of horizontal inequity in the income tax. The vertical action of the tax is captured by its inequality effect on average between groups of pre-tax equals. Putting the two together, horizontal...

Some analysts use sequential dominance criteria, and others use equivalence scales in combination with non-sequential dominance tests, to make welfare comparisons of joint distributions of income and needs. In this paper we present a new sequential procedure which copes with situations in which...

Do individuals choose their reference groups, i.e. their Joneses, or are they culturally transmitted across generations? We provide evidence that feeds the theoretical debate about the endogeneity or exogeneity of reference groups. Our findings for Uruguay suggest that reference groups are...