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Goodness-of-Fit: An Economic Approach

Author

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  • Sanghamitra Bandyopadhyay
  • Frank A Cowell
  • Emmanuel Flachaire

Abstract

Specific functional forms are often used in economic models of distributions; goodness-of-fit measures are used to assess whether a functional form is appropriate in the light of real-world data. Standard approaches use a distance criterion based on the EDF, an aggregation of differences in observed and theoretical cumulative frequencies. However, an economic approach to the problem should involve a measure of the information loss from using a badly-fitting model. This would involve an aggregation of, for example, individual income discrepancies between model and data. We provide an axiomatisation of an approach and applications to illustrate its importance.

Suggested Citation

  • Sanghamitra Bandyopadhyay & Frank A Cowell & Emmanuel Flachaire, 2009. "Goodness-of-Fit: An Economic Approach," STICERD - Distributional Analysis Research Programme Papers 101, Suntory and Toyota International Centres for Economics and Related Disciplines, LSE.
  • Handle: RePEc:cep:stidar:101
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    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Frank Schorfheide, 2000. "Loss function-based evaluation of DSGE models," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 15(6), pages 645-670.
    2. Cowell, Frank A., 1980. "Generalized entropy and the measurement of distributional change," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 13(1), pages 147-159, January.
    3. Cameron, A Colin & Windmeijer, Frank A G, 1996. "R-Squared Measures for Count Data Regression Models with Applications to Health-Care Utilization," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 14(2), pages 209-220, April.
    4. Colin Cameron, A. & Windmeijer, Frank A. G., 1997. "An R-squared measure of goodness of fit for some common nonlinear regression models," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 77(2), pages 329-342, April.
    5. Atkinson, Anthony B., 1970. "On the measurement of inequality," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 2(3), pages 244-263, September.
    6. Blackorby, Charles & Donaldson, David, 1978. "Measures of relative equality and their meaning in terms of social welfare," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 18(1), pages 59-80, June.
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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Erik Figueiredo, 2011. "A Note on the Measurement of Unfair Inequality in Brazil," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 31(4), pages 2944-2951.
    2. Fabio Clementi & Mauro Gallegati & Giorgio Kaniadakis, 2012. "A new model of income distribution: the κ-generalized distribution," Journal of Economics, Springer, vol. 105(1), pages 63-91, January.
    3. Frank Cowell & Emmanuel Flachaire & Sanghamitra Bandyopadhyay, 2013. "Reference distributions and inequality measurement," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 11(4), pages 421-437, December.
    4. VAN KERM Philippe & YU Seunghee & CHOE Chung, 2014. "Wage differentials between native, immigrant and cross-border workers: Evidence and model comparisons," LISER Working Paper Series 2014-05, Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research (LISER).
    5. Denisa M. Sologon & Philippe Kerm & Jinjing Li & Cathal O’Donoghue, 2021. "Accounting for differences in income inequality across countries: tax-benefit policy, labour market structure, returns and demographics," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 19(1), pages 13-43, March.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    goodness of fit; discrepancy; income distribution; inequalitymeasurement;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D63 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics - - - Equity, Justice, Inequality, and Other Normative Criteria and Measurement
    • C10 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods and Methodology: General - - - General

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