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Income and Wealth Above the Median: New Measurements and Results for Europe and the United States

In: What Drives Inequality?

Author

Listed:
  • Louis Chauvel
  • Anne Hartung
  • Eyal Bar-Haim
  • Philippe Van Kerm

Abstract

The study of the upper tail of the income and wealth distributions is important to the understanding of economic inequality. By means of the ‘isograph’, a new tool to describe income or wealth distributions, the authors compare wealth and income and wealth-to-income ratios in 16 European countries and the United States using data for years 2013/2014 from the Eurozone Household Finance and Consumption Survey and the US Survey on Consumer Finance. Focussing on the top half of the distribution, the authors find that for households in the top income quintile, wealth-to-income ratios generally increase rapidly with income; the association between high wealth and high incomes is highest among the highest percentiles. There is generally a positive relationship between median wealth in the country and the wealth of the top 1%. However, the United States is an outlier where the median wealth is relatively low but the wealth of the top 1% is extremely high.

Suggested Citation

  • Louis Chauvel & Anne Hartung & Eyal Bar-Haim & Philippe Van Kerm, 2019. "Income and Wealth Above the Median: New Measurements and Results for Europe and the United States," Research on Economic Inequality, in: What Drives Inequality?, volume 27, pages 89-104, Emerald Group Publishing Limited.
    • Handle: RePEc:eme:reinzz:s1049-258520190000027007
    DOI: 10.1108/S1049-258520190000027007
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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Louis Chauvel, 2023. "Isograph and LaSiPiKa Distribution: The Comparative Morphology of Income Inequalities and Intelligible Parameters of 53 LIS Countries 1967-2020," LIS Working papers 852, LIS Cross-National Data Center in Luxembourg.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Inequality; income; wealth; distributions; isograph; D31; C16; C46;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D31 - Microeconomics - - Distribution - - - Personal Income and Wealth Distribution
    • C16 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods and Methodology: General - - - Econometric and Statistical Methods; Specific Distributions
    • C46 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods: Special Topics - - - Specific Distributions

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