We analyze the extent of inequality of opportunities and inequality of outcome in nine developed countries during the 90's. We define equality of opportunity as the situation where income distributions conditional on social origin cannot be ranked according to stochastic dominance criteria. Stochastic dominance is assessed using non-parametric statistical tests. Our data come from national household surveys and social origin is defined by the respondent's father's education. USA and Italy show up as the most unequal countries both in terms of outcome and opportunity. At the opposite extreme, income distributions conditional on the fathers' education are quite similar in Scandinavian countries even before any redistributive policy. The analysis highlights that inequality of outcomes and inequality of opportunities can sometimes lead to different pictures. For instance, France and Germany experience a similar level of inequality of income while the former country is much more unequal than the latter from the point of view of inequality of opportunity. Differences in rankings according to inequality of outcome and inequality of opportunity underscore the importance of the policymaker's choice of the conception of equality to promote.
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Paper provided by Institute for Social and Economic Research in its series ISER working papers with number
2005-15.
Length: 45 Date of creation: 31 Aug 2005 Date of revision: Publication status: published Handle: RePEc:ese:iserwp:2005-15
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References listed on IDEAS 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.:
Shorrocks, Anthony F, 1983.
"Ranking Income Distributions,"
Economica,
London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 50(197), pages 3-17, February.
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