IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gde/journl/gde_v64_n1_p55-92.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

A Measure of Welfare Based on Permanent Income Hypothesis: An Application on Italian Households Budgets

Author

Listed:
  • Riccardo Massari

    (University "La Sapienza", Rome)

Abstract

The measurement of the actual household welfare is possibly the main problem in welfare analysis. Since welfare is not directly observable, researchers have to find a proxy to measure it. The aim of this work is to find a measure of welfare based on cross-sectional data. The measure proposed is a linear combination of observable indicators. Using data from the Bank of Italy SHIW, this paper provides some evidence that, under assumptions that are not very restrictive, this measure could properly depict the actual ranking of households in terms of their economic status.

Suggested Citation

  • Riccardo Massari, 2005. "A Measure of Welfare Based on Permanent Income Hypothesis: An Application on Italian Households Budgets," Giornale degli Economisti, GDE (Giornale degli Economisti e Annali di Economia), Bocconi University, vol. 64(1), pages 55-92, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:gde:journl:gde_v64_n1_p55-92
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: ftp://ftp.gde.unibocconi.it/gde_articles/2005/GDE_V64_N1_P55-92.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Timothy Smeeding & Gunther Schmaus & Brigitte Buhmann & Lee Rainwater, 1988. "Equivalence Scales, Well-Being, Inequality and Poverty: Sensitivity Estimates Across Ten Countries Using the LIS Database," LIS Working papers 17, LIS Cross-National Data Center in Luxembourg.
    2. Foster, James & Greer, Joel & Thorbecke, Erik, 1984. "A Class of Decomposable Poverty Measures," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 52(3), pages 761-766, May.
    3. Kay, J. A. & Keen, M. J. & Morris, C. N., 1984. "Estimating consumption from expenditure data," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 23(1-2), pages 169-181.
    4. Richard Breen & Pasi Moisio, 2004. "Poverty dynamics corrected for measurement error," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 2(3), pages 171-191, July.
    5. Ramses ABUL NAGA & Robin BURGESS, 1997. "Prediction and Determination of Household Permanent Income," Cahiers de Recherches Economiques du Département d'économie 9705, Université de Lausanne, Faculté des HEC, Département d’économie.
    6. Richard Blundell & Ian Preston, 1998. "Consumption Inequality and Income Uncertainty," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 113(2), pages 603-640.
    7. Atkinson, Anthony B., 1970. "On the measurement of inequality," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 2(3), pages 244-263, September.
    8. Shorrocks, A F, 1978. "The Measurement of Mobility," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 46(5), pages 1013-1024, September.
    9. repec:bla:econom:v:72:y:2005:i:3:p:497-514 is not listed on IDEAS
    10. Ramses H. ABUL NAGA, 1996. "Prediction and Sufficiency in the Model of Factor Analysis," Cahiers de Recherches Economiques du Département d'économie 9616, Université de Lausanne, Faculté des HEC, Département d’économie.
    11. Muellbauer, John, 1994. "The Assessment: Consumer Expenditure," Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Oxford University Press and Oxford Review of Economic Policy Limited, vol. 10(2), pages 1-41, Summer.
    12. Ramses H. Abul Naga, 2005. "Social Welfare Orderings: A Life‐Cycle Perspective," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 72(287), pages 497-514, August.
    13. Ramses H. Abul Naga, 1994. "Identifying the Poor: A Multiple Indicator Approach," STICERD - Distributional Analysis Research Programme Papers 09, Suntory and Toyota International Centres for Economics and Related Disciplines, LSE.
    14. Sabelhaus, John & Schneider, Ulrike, 1997. "Measuring The Distribution Of Well-Being: Why Income and Consumption Give Different Answers," Hannover Economic Papers (HEP) dp-201, Leibniz Universität Hannover, Wirtschaftswissenschaftliche Fakultät.
    15. Biewen, Martin, 2002. "Bootstrap inference for inequality, mobility and poverty measurement," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 108(2), pages 317-342, June.
    16. Rosati, Nicoletta, 2003. "How has economic inequality evolved over the past two decades? A look at the Italian experience," Research in Economics, Elsevier, vol. 57(2), pages 93-122, June.
    17. Glewwe, Paul & van der Gaag, Jacques, 1990. "Identifying the poor in developing countries: Do different definitions matter?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 18(6), pages 803-814, June.
    18. Milton Friedman, 1957. "A Theory of the Consumption Function," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number frie57-1, October.
    19. Brigitte Buhmann & Lee Rainwater & Guenther Schmaus & Timothy M. Smeeding, 1988. "Equivalence Scales, Well‐Being, Inequality, And Poverty: Sensitivity Estimates Across Ten Countries Using The Luxembourg Income Study (Lis) Database," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 34(2), pages 115-142, June.
    20. repec:bla:revinw:v:34:y:1988:i:2:p:115-42 is not listed on IDEAS
    21. Richard Blundell & Ian Preston, 1994. "Income or consumption in the measurement of inequality and poverty?," IFS Working Papers W94/12, Institute for Fiscal Studies.
    22. Chaudhuri, Shubham & Ravallion, Martin, 1994. "How well do static indicators identify the chronically poor?," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 53(3), pages 367-394, March.
    23. Patterson, K D, 1992. "The Service Flow from Consumption Goods with an Application to Friedman's Permanent Income Hypothesis," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 44(2), pages 289-305, April.
    24. Ramsès H. Abul Naga & Enrico Bolzani, 2006. "Poverty and Permanent Income: A Methodology for Cross-Section Data," Annals of Economics and Statistics, GENES, issue 81, pages 195-223.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Matthew Roskruge & Jacques Poot & Laura King, 2016. "Social capital, entrepreneurship and living standards: differences between migrants and the native born," Chapters, in: Hans Westlund & Johan P. Larsson (ed.), Handbook of Social Capital and Regional Development, chapter 9, pages 221-254, Edward Elgar Publishing.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Ramsès H. Abul Naga & Enrico Bolzani, 2006. "Poverty and Permanent Income: A Methodology for Cross-Section Data," Annals of Economics and Statistics, GENES, issue 81, pages 195-223.
    2. John Creedy & Cath Sleeman, 2005. "Adult equivalence scales, inequality and poverty," New Zealand Economic Papers, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 39(1), pages 51-81.
    3. P. Jenkins, Stephen & Jäntti, Markus, 2013. "Income mobility," ISER Working Paper Series 2013-23, Institute for Social and Economic Research.
    4. Salvatore Morelli & Timothy Smeeding & Jeffrey Thompson, 2014. "Post-1970 Trends in Within-Country Inequality and Poverty: Rich and Middle Income Countries," CSEF Working Papers 356, Centre for Studies in Economics and Finance (CSEF), University of Naples, Italy.
    5. Disney, Richard & Whitehouse, Edward, 2001. "Cross-country comparisons of pensioners’ incomes," MPRA Paper 16345, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    6. John Creedy & Catherine Sleeman, 2004. "Adult Equivalence Scales, Inequality and Poverty in New Zealand," Treasury Working Paper Series 04/21, New Zealand Treasury.
    7. Whitehouse, Edward, 2000. "How Poor are the Old? A Survey of Evidence from 44 Countries," MPRA Paper 14177, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    8. Bibi, Sami & Duclos, Jean-Yves, 2007. "Equity and policy effectiveness with imperfect targeting," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 83(1), pages 109-140, May.
    9. Ramses H. Abul Naga, 2005. "Social Welfare Orderings: A Life‐Cycle Perspective," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 72(287), pages 497-514, August.
    10. François Bourguignon & Francisco Ferreira & Phillippe Leite, 2008. "Beyond Oaxaca–Blinder: Accounting for differences in household income distributions," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 6(2), pages 117-148, June.
    11. Prieto Suarez, Joaquin, 2021. "Poverty traps and affluence shields: modelling the persistence of income position in Chile," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 110719, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    12. Gordon Anderson, 2003. "Poverty in America 1970-1990: who did gain ground? An application of stochastic dominance criteria employing simultaneous inequality tests in a partial panel," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 18(6), pages 621-640.
    13. Ankita Mishra & Ranjan Ray, 2013. "Multi-Dimensional Deprivation in India During and After the Reforms: Do the Household Expenditure and the Family Health Surveys Present Consistent Evidence?," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 110(2), pages 791-818, January.
    14. Hillringhaus, Tilman & Peichl, Andreas, 2010. "Die Messung von Armut unter Berücksichtigung regional divergierender Lebenshaltungskosten und öffentlicher Leistungen," IZA Discussion Papers 5344, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    15. repec:pru:wpaper:41 is not listed on IDEAS
    16. Pedro Salas-Rojo & Juan Gabriel Rodríguez, 2022. "Inheritances and wealth inequality: a machine learning approach," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 20(1), pages 27-51, March.
    17. Thomas F. Crossley & Krishna Pendakur, 2002. "Consumption Inequality," Department of Economics Working Papers 2002-09, McMaster University.
    18. Eva Sierminska & Yelena Takhtamanova, 2006. "Wealth Effects Out of Financial and Housing Wealth: Cross Country and Age Group Comparisons," LWS Working papers 4, LIS Cross-National Data Center in Luxembourg.
    19. William Horrace & Joseph Marchand & Timothy Smeeding, 2008. "Ranking inequality: Applications of multivariate subset selection," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 6(1), pages 5-32, March.
    20. Regan, Mark & Kakoulidou, Theano, 2022. "How important are the unit of analysis and equivalence scales when measuring income poverty and inequality? Evidence from Ireland," Papers WP721, Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI).
    21. Bönke, Timm & Eichfelder, Sebastian, 2008. "Horizontale Gleichheit im Abgaben-Transfersystem: eine Analyse äquivalenter Einkommen von Arbeitnehmern in Deutschland," arqus Discussion Papers in Quantitative Tax Research 36, arqus - Arbeitskreis Quantitative Steuerlehre.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    JEL classification:

    • C14 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods and Methodology: General - - - Semiparametric and Nonparametric Methods: General
    • C31 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Multiple or Simultaneous Equation Models; Multiple Variables - - - Cross-Sectional Models; Spatial Models; Treatment Effect Models; Quantile Regressions; Social Interaction Models
    • I32 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - Measurement and Analysis of Poverty

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gde:journl:gde_v64_n1_p55-92. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Erika Somma The email address of this maintainer does not seem to be valid anymore. Please ask Erika Somma to update the entry or send us the correct address (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.gde.unibocconi.it/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.