This paper analyses the impact of capital gains on the level and distribution of wealth held by Italian households between 1989 and 2005. The evaluation of these issues is achieved using both macro and micro data in order to obtain a more robust result. The estimation of capital gains through macro data is obtained using national accounts data while micro data from the Bank of Italy’s Survey of Household Income and Wealth are used to reconstruct capital gains accounting for price variations in the single assets composing wealth and for households’ idiosyncratic characteristics. Capital gains, defined as in the national accounts, explain about 40 per cent of the growth in real per capita wealth observed over the whole period, and about one-third of the growth in wealth concentration. Using capital gains reconstruction we estimate that households’ inter-temporal mobility between wealth classes is significantly affected by capital gains, to which 20 per cent of the observed transitions can be ascribed. Furthermore, capital gains take second place among the determinants of wealth variations at the household level, behind savings but ahead of intergenerational transfers.
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
page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS
site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
Publisher Info
Paper provided by University Library of Munich, Germany in its series MPRA Paper with number
15108.
Find related papers by JEL classification: D31 - Microeconomics - - Distribution - - - Personal Income and Wealth Distribution E31 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Price Level; Inflation; Deflation
This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:
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.:
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.)