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Does the CPI Mirror the Cost of Living? Engel's Law Suggests Not in Norway

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  • Erling Røed Larsen

Abstract

There is considerable interest in identifying the magnitude of the difference between increases in the CPI and the cost of living. In this paper, the technique proposed by Hamilton (2001) to measure this discrepancy is used and extended for Norway in the 1990s. While Hamilton finds that the CPI in the United States overstates the cost of living for the period 1974–1991, application of his technique to Norwegian data for 1990–1999 indicates that the CPI understates the cost of living. The Norwegian CPI rose by 22 percent, but a typical household behaved as if the cost of living had increased by 35 percent. For some household types, the increase was substantially larger.

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  • Erling Røed Larsen, 2007. "Does the CPI Mirror the Cost of Living? Engel's Law Suggests Not in Norway," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 109(1), pages 177-195, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:scandj:v:109:y:2007:i:1:p:177-195
    DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-9442.2007.00487.x
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    1. Case Karl E. & Quigley John M. & Shiller Robert J., 2005. "Comparing Wealth Effects: The Stock Market versus the Housing Market," The B.E. Journal of Macroeconomics, De Gruyter, vol. 5(1), pages 1-34, May.
    2. Erling Røed Larsen, 2002. "Estimating Latent Total Consumption in a Household," Discussion Papers 324, Statistics Norway, Research Department.
    3. Erling Røed Larsen, 2002. "Searching for Basic Consumption Patterns Is the Engel Elasticity of Housing Unity?," Discussion Papers 323, Statistics Norway, Research Department.
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    2. Almås, Ingvild & Johnsen, Åshild Auglænd, 2012. "The cost of living in China: Implications for inequality and poverty," Discussion Paper Series in Economics 21/2012, Norwegian School of Economics, Department of Economics.
    3. Ingvild Almås & Anders Kjelsrud & Rohini Somanathan, 2019. "A Behavior‐Based Approach to the Estimation of Poverty in India," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 121(1), pages 182-224, January.
    4. Emi Nakamura & Jón Steinsson & Miao Liu, 2016. "Are Chinese Growth and Inflation Too Smooth? Evidence from Engel Curves," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 8(3), pages 113-144, July.
    5. Erling Røed Larsen, 2014. "Is the Engel curve approach viable in the estimation of alternative PPPs?," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 47(3), pages 881-904, November.
    6. Ingvild Almås & Tim Beatty & Thomas Crossley, 2018. "Lost in translation: What do Engel curves tell us about the cost of living?," IFS Working Papers W18/04, Institute for Fiscal Studies.
    7. Susan Olivia & John Gibson, 2013. "Using Engel curves to measure CPI bias for Indonesia," Bulletin of Indonesian Economic Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 49(1), pages 85-101, April.
    8. Gaddis,Isis, 2016. "Prices for poverty analysis in Africa," Policy Research Working Paper Series 7652, The World Bank.
    9. James Gorry & Dean Scrimgeour, 2018. "Using Engel Curves To Estimate Consumer Price Index Bias For The Elderly," Contemporary Economic Policy, Western Economic Association International, vol. 36(3), pages 539-553, July.
    10. Trevon D. Logan, 2008. "Are Engel Curve Estimates of CPI Bias Biased?," NBER Working Papers 13870, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    11. Chunyun Wang & Xiaoxi Yu & Jiang Zhao, 2022. "Identifying the Real Income Disparity in Prefecture-Level Cities in China: Measurement of Subnational Purchasing Power Parity Based on the Stochastic Approach," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(16), pages 1-24, August.
    12. Filho, Irineu de Carvalho & Chamon, Marcos, 2012. "The myth of post-reform income stagnation: Evidence from Brazil and Mexico," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 97(2), pages 368-386.
    13. Andrew Dabalen & Isis Gaddis & Nga Thi Viet Nguyen, 2020. "CPI Bias and its Implications for Poverty Reduction in Africa," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 18(1), pages 13-44, March.
    14. Beatty, Timothy K.M. & Larsen, Erling Røed & Sommervoll, Dag Einar, 2010. "Using house prices to compute the price of housing in the CPI," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 106(3), pages 238-240, March.
    15. Mark A. Wynne, 2008. "How should central banks define price stability?," Globalization Institute Working Papers 08, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.
    16. Ingvild Almas & Ashild Johnsen, 2018. "The cost of a growth miracle - reassessing price and poverty trends in China," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 30, pages 239-264, October.

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