IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eej/eeconj/v14y1988i1p81-85.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

On One Parameter Functional Forms for Lorenz Curves

Author

Listed:
  • Paul D. Thistle
  • John P. Formby

Abstract

This paper shows that using a one-parameter functional form for the Lorenz curve is equivalent to ranking income distributions based on their Gini indices. Irrespective of the underlying data, the fitted Lorenz curves can never intersect. Circu mstances in which one-parameter Lorenz curves can safely be specified are identified and their policy relevance discussed.

Suggested Citation

  • Paul D. Thistle & John P. Formby, 1988. "On One Parameter Functional Forms for Lorenz Curves," Eastern Economic Journal, Eastern Economic Association, vol. 14(1), pages 81-85, Jan-Mar.
    • Handle: RePEc:eej:eeconj:v:14:y:1988:i:1:p:81-85
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://web.holycross.edu/RePEc/eej/Archive/Volume14/V14N1P81_85.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Gupta, Manash Ranjan, 1984. "Functional Form for Estimating the Lorenz Curve," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 52(5), pages 1313-1314, September.
    2. Rasche, R H, et al, 1980. "Functional Forms for Estimating the Lorenz Curve: Comment," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 48(4), pages 1061-1062, May.
    3. Dasgupta, Partha & Sen, Amartya & Starrett, David, 1973. "Notes on the measurement of inequality," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 6(2), pages 180-187, April.
    4. Browning, Edgar K & Johnson, William R, 1984. "The Trade-Off between Equality and Efficiency," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 92(2), pages 175-203, April.
    5. Suits, Daniel B, 1977. "Measurement of Tax Progressivity," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 67(4), pages 747-752, September.
    6. Shorrocks, Anthony F, 1983. "Ranking Income Distributions," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 50(197), pages 3-17, February.
    7. Sen, Amartya, 1973. "On Economic Inequality," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780198281931.
    8. Lambert, Peter J, 1985. "On the Redistributive Effect of Taxes and Benefits," Scottish Journal of Political Economy, Scottish Economic Society, vol. 32(1), pages 39-54, February.
    9. Atkinson, Anthony B., 1970. "On the measurement of inequality," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 2(3), pages 244-263, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Yu Hsing, 1991. "Unemployment and the GNP Gap: Okun's Law Revisited," Eastern Economic Journal, Eastern Economic Association, vol. 17(4), pages 409-416, Oct-Dec.
    2. Louis Mesnard, 2022. "About some difficulties with the functional forms of Lorenz curves," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 20(4), pages 939-950, December.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Sarabia, J. -M. & Castillo, Enrique & Slottje, Daniel J., 1999. "An ordered family of Lorenz curves," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 91(1), pages 43-60, July.
    2. ZuXiang Wang & Yew-Kwang Ng & Russell Smyth, 2007. "Revisiting The Ordered Family Of Lorenz Curves," Monash Economics Working Papers 19-07, Monash University, Department of Economics.
    3. WANG, Zuxiang & SMYTH, Russell & NG, Yew-Kwang, 2009. "A new ordered family of Lorenz curves with an application to measuring income inequality and poverty in rural China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 20(2), pages 218-235, June.
    4. Sarabia Alegría, J.M & Pascual Sáez, Marta, 2001. "Rankings de distribuciones de renta basados en curvas de Lorenz ordenadas: un estudio empírico1," Estudios de Economia Aplicada, Estudios de Economia Aplicada, vol. 19, pages 151-169, Diciembre.
    5. Duclos, Jean-Yves, 1998. "Social evaluation functions, economic isolation and the Suits index of progressivity," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(1), pages 103-121, July.
    6. Duclos, J.Y., 1995. "Economic Isolation, Inequality, and the Suits Index of Progressivity," Papers 9510, Laval - Recherche en Politique Economique.
    7. Louis Kaplow, 2005. "Why measure inequality?," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 3(1), pages 65-79, April.
    8. Poddar, Satya N. & Genser, Bernd, 1986. "Measurement of effective tax progression," Discussion Papers, Series I 224, University of Konstanz, Department of Economics.
    9. José‐María Sarabia & Enrique Castillo & Daniel J. Slottje, 2001. "An Exponential Family of Lorenz Curves," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 67(3), pages 748-756, January.
    10. Karsu, Özlem & Morton, Alec, 2015. "Inequity averse optimization in operational research," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 245(2), pages 343-359.
    11. Chakravarty, Satya R. & Sarkar, Palash, 2022. "A synthesis of local and effective tax progressivity measurement," MPRA Paper 115180, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    12. Carbonell-Nicolau, Oriol & Llavador, Humberto, 2018. "Inequality reducing properties of progressive income tax schedules: the case of endogenous income," Theoretical Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 13(1), January.
    13. Fatiha Bennia & Nicolas Gravel & Brice Magdalou & Patrick Moyes, 2022. "Is body weight better distributed among men than among women? A robust normative analysis for France, the UK, and the US," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 124(1), pages 69-103, January.
    14. Benoît Tarroux, 2012. "Are equalization payments making Canadians better off? A two-dimensional dominance answer," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 10(1), pages 19-44, March.
    15. Laurent Derobert & Guillaume Thieriot, 2003. "The Lorenz curve as an archetype: A historico-epistemological study," The European Journal of the History of Economic Thought, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 10(4), pages 573-585.
    16. John P. Formby & Steven G. Medema & W. James Smith, 1995. "Tax Neutrality and Social Welfare in a Comptutational General Equilibrium Framework," Public Finance Review, , vol. 23(4), pages 419-447, October.
    17. Morton, Alec, 2014. "Aversion to health inequalities in healthcare prioritisation: A multicriteria optimisation perspective," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 36(C), pages 164-173.
    18. Francesco Andreoli & Claudio Zoli, 2020. "From unidimensional to multidimensional inequality: a review," METRON, Springer;Sapienza Università di Roma, vol. 78(1), pages 5-42, April.
    19. repec:zbw:hohpro:331 is not listed on IDEAS
    20. Walter Bossert & Bhaskar Dutta, 2019. "The measurement of welfare change," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 53(4), pages 603-619, December.
    21. Gravel, Nicolas & Moyes, Patrick, 2012. "Ethically robust comparisons of bidimensional distributions with an ordinal attribute," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 147(4), pages 1384-1426.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eej:eeconj:v:14:y:1988:i:1:p:81-85. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Victor Matheson, College of the Holy Cross (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/eeaa1ea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.