Semiparametric Engel curves are used to infer bias in the Canadian CPI as a Cost of Living Index. The budget share of food has long been used as an indicator of welfare. We compare households with the same levels of CPI deflated total expenditure over the period 1978-2000. Differences in the expenditure share of food are attributed to the CPI failing to capture changes in costs of living. We employ a novel econometric approach using a single index penalized linear spline model. Over the period, we find that the CPI overstated changes in the cost of living between 1.33 and 1.86% for the four household types considered.
Download Info
To download:
If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the
proper application to
view it first. Information about this may be contained
in the File-Format links below. In case of further problems read
the IDEAS help
file. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS
site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version under "Related research" (further below) or search for a different version of it.
Contact details of provider: Postal: Canadian Economics Association Prof. Steven Ambler, Secretary-Treasurer c/o Olivier Lebert, CEA/CJE/CPP Office CIREQ-C.R.D.E., Université de Montréal C.P. 6128, succursale Centre-ville Montréal, Québec, H3C 3J7, Canada Email: Web page: http://economics.ca/cje/ More information through EDIRC
For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its listing, contact: (Prof. Werner Antweiler).
Related research
Keywords:
Other versions of this item:
Find related papers by JEL classification: D1 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior C1 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods: General
Cited by: (explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.)