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Is the Top Tail of the Wealth Distribution the Missing Link between the Household Finance and Consumption Survey and National Accounts?

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  • Chakraborty Robin

    (Deutsche Bundesbank, Wilhelm-Epstein-Strasse 14, DE-60431Frankfurt am Main, Germany.)

  • Kavonius Ilja Kristian

    (University of Helsinki, P.O. Box 3, FI-00014, Finland.)

  • Pérez-Duarte Sébastien
  • Vermeulen Philip

    (European Central Bank, DE-60640Frankfurt am Main, Germany.)

Abstract

The financial accounts of the household sector within the system of national accounts report the aggregate asset holdings and liabilities of all households within a country. In principle, when household wealth surveys are explicitly designed to be representative of all households, aggregating these microdata should correspond to the macro-aggregates. In practice, however, differences are large. We first discuss conceptual and generic differences between those two sources of data. Thereafter, we investigate missing top tail observation from wealth surveys as a source of discrepancy. By fitting a Pareto distribution to the upper tail, we provide an estimate of how much of the gap between the micro- and macrodata is caused by the underestimation of the top tail of the wealth distribution. Conceptual and generic differences, as well as missing top tail observations, explain part of the gap between financial accounts and survey aggregates.

Suggested Citation

  • Chakraborty Robin & Kavonius Ilja Kristian & Pérez-Duarte Sébastien & Vermeulen Philip, 2019. "Is the Top Tail of the Wealth Distribution the Missing Link between the Household Finance and Consumption Survey and National Accounts?," Journal of Official Statistics, Sciendo, vol. 35(1), pages 31-65, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:vrs:offsta:v:35:y:2019:i:1:p:31-65:n:3
    DOI: 10.2478/jos-2019-0003
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    Cited by:

    1. Michele Cantarella & Andrea Neri & Giovanna Ranalli, 2021. "Mind the wealth gap: a new allocation method to match micro and macro statistics on household wealth," Questioni di Economia e Finanza (Occasional Papers) 646, Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area.
    2. Engel, Janina & Riera, Pau Gayà & Grilli, Joseph & Sola, Pierre, 2022. "Developing reconciled quarterly distributional national wealth – insight into inequality and wealth structures," Working Paper Series 2687, European Central Bank.
    3. Wildauer, Rafael & Heck, Ines & Kapeller, Jakob, 2023. "Was Pareto right? Is the distribution of wealth thick-tailed?," Greenwich Papers in Political Economy 38597, University of Greenwich, Greenwich Political Economy Research Centre.
    4. Ahnert, Henning & Kavonius, Ilja Kristian & Honkkila, Juha & Sola, Pierre, 2020. "Understanding household wealth: linking macro and micro data to produce distributional financial accounts," Statistics Paper Series 37, European Central Bank.
    5. Bach, Stefan & Thiemann, Andreas & Zucco, Aline, 2019. "Looking for the missing rich: tracing the top tail of the wealth distribution," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 26(6), pages 1234-1258.
    6. Krenek Alexander & Schratzenstaller Margit, 2022. "A Harmonized Net Wealth Tax in the European Union," Journal of Economics and Statistics (Jahrbuecher fuer Nationaloekonomie und Statistik), De Gruyter, vol. 242(5-6), pages 629-668, December.
    7. Sofie R. Waltl & Robin Chakraborty, 2022. "Missing the wealthy in the HFCS: micro problems with macro implications," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 20(1), pages 169-203, March.
    8. KRENEK Alexander & SCHRATZENSTALLER Margit & GRUNBERGER Klaus & THIEMANN Andreas, 2022. "INTAXMOD - Inheritance and Gift Taxation in the Context of Ageing," JRC Working Papers on Taxation & Structural Reforms 2022-04, Joint Research Centre.
    9. Apostel, Arthur & O'Neill, Daniel W., 2022. "A one-off wealth tax for Belgium: Revenue potential, distributional impact, and environmental effects," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 196(C).

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Financial accounts; HFCS; wealth inequality; Pareto distribution; households;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C46 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods: Special Topics - - - Specific Distributions
    • D31 - Microeconomics - - Distribution - - - Personal Income and Wealth Distribution
    • E01 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - General - - - Measurement and Data on National Income and Product Accounts and Wealth; Environmental Accounts

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