IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/scandj/v109y2007i1p177-195.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

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

Author

Listed:
  • 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.

Suggested Citation

  • 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
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9442.2007.00487.x
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/j.1467-9442.2007.00487.x?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    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. "Searching for Basic Consumption Patterns Is the Engel Elasticity of Housing Unity?," Discussion Papers 323, Statistics Norway, Research Department.
    3. Erling Røed Larsen, 2002. "Estimating Latent Total Consumption in a Household," Discussion Papers 324, Statistics Norway, Research Department.
    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. 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.
    2. 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.
    3. 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.
    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. 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.
    6. 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.
    7. Trevon D. Logan, 2008. "Are Engel Curve Estimates of CPI Bias Biased?," NBER Working Papers 13870, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    8. 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.
    9. 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.
    10. 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.
    11. Mark A. Wynne, 2008. "How should central banks define price stability?," Globalization Institute Working Papers 08, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.
    12. Garry F. Barrett & Matthew Brzozowski, 2010. "Using Engel Curves to Estimate the Bias in the Australian CPI," The Economic Record, The Economic Society of Australia, vol. 86(272), pages 1-14, March.
    13. 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.
    14. Gaddis,Isis, 2016. "Prices for poverty analysis in Africa," Policy Research Working Paper Series 7652, The World Bank.
    15. 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.
    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.

    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. Dettling, Lisa J. & Kearney, Melissa S., 2014. "House prices and birth rates: The impact of the real estate market on the decision to have a baby," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 110(C), pages 82-100.
    2. Michael F. Lovenheim & Kevin J. Mumford, 2010. "Do Family Wealth Shocks Affect Fertility Choices? Evidence from the Housing Market Boom and Bust," Purdue University Economics Working Papers 1228, Purdue University, Department of Economics.
    3. Michail Karoglou & Bruce Morley & Dennis Thomas, 2013. "Risk and Structural Instability in US House Prices," The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, Springer, vol. 46(3), pages 424-436, April.
    4. Stolbov, M., 2012. "Financial Accelerator Theory and the Russian Mortgage Market," Journal of the New Economic Association, New Economic Association, vol. 13(1), pages 79-98.
    5. Cohen, Jeffrey P. & Ioannides, Yannis M. & (Wirathip) Thanapisitikul, Win, 2016. "Spatial effects and house price dynamics in the USA," Journal of Housing Economics, Elsevier, vol. 31(C), pages 1-13.
    6. Nyakabawo, Wendy & Miller, Stephen M. & Balcilar, Mehmet & Das, Sonali & Gupta, Rangan, 2015. "Temporal causality between house prices and output in the US: A bootstrap rolling-window approach," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 33(C), pages 55-73.
    7. Ciarlone, Alessio, 2011. "Housing wealth effect in emerging economies," Emerging Markets Review, Elsevier, vol. 12(4), pages 399-417.
    8. Cho, Sungwon, 2011. "Housing wealth effect on consumption: Evidence from household level data," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 113(2), pages 192-194.
    9. Savignac, Frédérique & Arrondel, Luc & Lamarche, Pierre, 2015. "Wealth effects on consumption across the wealth distribution: empirical evidence," Working Paper Series 1817, European Central Bank.
    10. Chorvat, Terrence, 2006. "Taxing utility," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 35(1), pages 1-16, February.
    11. Mr. Christopher Carroll & Mr. Martin Sommer & Mr. Jiri Slacalek, 2012. "Dissecting Saving Dynamics: Measuring Wealth, Precautionary, and Credit Effects," IMF Working Papers 2012/219, International Monetary Fund.
    12. Charles Ka Yui Leung & Joe Cho Yiu Ng, 2018. "Macro Aspects of Housing," GRU Working Paper Series GRU_2018_016, City University of Hong Kong, Department of Economics and Finance, Global Research Unit.
    13. Jawadi, Fredj & Soparnot, Richard & Sousa, Ricardo M., 2017. "Assessing financial and housing wealth effects through the lens of a nonlinear framework," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 39(PB), pages 840-850.
    14. Crowe, Christopher & Dell’Ariccia, Giovanni & Igan, Deniz & Rabanal, Pau, 2013. "How to deal with real estate booms: Lessons from country experiences," Journal of Financial Stability, Elsevier, vol. 9(3), pages 300-319.
    15. Janine Aron & John Muellbauer, 2006. "Housing Wealth, Credit Conditions and Consumption," CSAE Working Paper Series 2006-08, Centre for the Study of African Economies, University of Oxford.
    16. Christopher D. Carroll & Misuzu Otsuka & Jirka Slacalek, 2006. "How Large Is the Housing Wealth Effect? A New Approach," NBER Working Papers 12746, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    17. Mehmet Balcilar & Rangan Gupta & Stephen M. Miller, 2015. "The out-of-sample forecasting performance of nonlinear models of regional housing prices in the US," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 47(22), pages 2259-2277, May.
    18. Vincent (Vincent Peter) Hogan & Patrick O'Sullivan, 2003. "Consumption and house prices in Ireland," Open Access publications 10197/330, School of Economics, University College Dublin.
    19. Ampudia, Miguel & Pavlickova, Akmaral & Slacalek, Jiri & Vogel, Edgar, 2016. "Household heterogeneity in the euro area since the onset of the Great Recession," Journal of Policy Modeling, Elsevier, vol. 38(1), pages 181-197.
    20. repec:esx:essedp:712 is not listed on IDEAS
    21. Thomas Grandner & Dieter Gstach, 2006. "Joint Adjustment of House Prices, Stock Prices and Output Towards Short‐run Equilibrium," Bulletin of Economic Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 58(1), pages 1-17, January.

    More about this item

    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:bla:scandj:v:109:y:2007:i:1:p:177-195. 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: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1111/(ISSN)1467-9442 .

    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.