Distribution Of Economic Well-being Research Articles

Accounting for the Value of Unpaid Domestic Work: A Cross-National Study of Variation across Household Types

Abstract This article estimates the value of extended earnings—market earnings plus the imputed value of unpaid work—and assesses how this alternative measure affects the level and distribution of economic wellbeing within households of differing compositions. Prior research finds that excluding the value of unpaid work distorts conclusions about women’s contributions to household income and inequality more generally. Variation across household types has been understudied. The authors use data from the Harmonized European and American Time Use Surveys, combined with income data from the Luxembourg Income Study Database, to assess outcomes in six European countries and the United States. The study compares market to extended earnings to assess inequality within and across household types: single adults with and without children, and cohabiting adults with and without children. Key findings include: (i) women's time in unpaid work exceeds men's in all study countries; (ii) shifting from market earnings to extended earnings narrows gender disparities in all countries; and (iii) moving to extended earnings reduces inequality among both women and men, but more so among women. On all outcomes, we find that household composition shapes women's outcomes more than men's, and, overall, parenting status plays a larger role than partnership status.

Changes in the Distribution of Economic Well-Being during the COVID-19 Pandemic: Evidence from Nationally Representative Consumption Data

Changes in the Distribution of Economic Well-Being during the COVID-19 Pandemic: Evidence from Nationally Representative Consumption Data

The roles of location and education in the distribution of economic well-being in Indonesia: hierarchical and non-hierarchical inequality decomposition analyses

This paper analyzes the roles of location (rural and urban sectors) and education in the distribution of economic well-being in Indonesia by employing the hierarchical and non-hierarchical decomposition methods of the Theil indices. This is done by using household expenditure data from the national socio-economic survey (Susenas) in 2008. It shows that there are large expenditure disparities across education levels but that these are more pronounced in the urban sector than the rural sector. When there are differences in educational structure between the rural and urban sectors, the hierarchical decomposition method appears to offer a better approach than the non-hierarchical method.

Value of housework time and changes in traditional economic well-being in Finland in 1979-2000

The paper looks at the change, the level and the structure of income distribution and distribution of consumption possibilities at the individual and at the household level between the years 1979 and 2000. I also pay attention to the development of low incomes when the concept of income is expanded to include a monetary measurement of household production. The paper uses Time Use Data, collected by Statistics Finland in 1979, 1987-1988 and 1999-2000. I find that consumption possibilities are more equally distributed than money income. Household production increases the consumption possibilities of all income groups but its effect is most significant in the low income decile groups. As a share of consumption possibilities, household production forms a significantly more important part for low income households than for high income households. By looking at consumption possibilities we can see a different distribution of economic well-being compared to distribution offered by money income measurement alone.

Household wealth and the measurement of economic well-being in the United States

We analyze the level and distribution of economic well-being in the United States during the 1980s and 1990s based on the standard measure of money income and a measure in which income from wealth is calculated as the sum of lifetime annuity from nonhome wealth and imputed rental-equivalent for owner-occupied homes. Over the 1982–2000 period, median well-being increases faster when these adjustments are made than when standard money income is used. This adjustment also widens the income gap between African-Americans and whites but increases the relative well-being of the elderly. Adding imputed rent and annuities from household wealth to household income considerably increases measured inequality and the share of income from wealth in inequality. However, both measures show about the same rise in inequality over the period. We also find an increasing share of wage and salary income in our expanded definition of income among the richest 1% over the period but do not find that the “working rich” have largely replaced rentiers at the top of the economic ladder.

Single Parent Families and the Shifting Distribution of US Family Well-Being

Nonparametric density estimates and a generalized decomposition technique are employed to explore the role that changes in family structure in the 1980s and 1990s played in observed shifts in the U.S. distribution of family economic well-being. Single-parent families are identified as playing a key role in shaping the incidence and distribution of economic well-being below two times the poverty line. Most notably, the increased incidence of persons in families below one-half the poverty line can be traced to both an increase in the share of single-parent families and an increase in the propensity of single-parent families to reside at these very low levels of economic well-being. Decompositions further trace the increased incidence of single-parent families below one-half the poverty line to those without a working adult and those without a head with a high-school degree.

Household Wealth and the Measurement of Economic Well-Being in the United States

The standard official measure of household economic well-being in the United States is gross money income. The general consensus is that such measures are limited because they ignore other crucial determinants of well-being. We modify the standard measure to account for one such determinant: household wealth. We then analyze the level and distribution of economic well-being in the United States during the 1980s and 1990s, using the standard measure and a measure that differs from the standard in that income from wealth is calculated as the sum of lifetime annuity from nonhome wealth and imputed rental-equivalent for owner-occupied homes. Our findings indicate that the level and distribution of economic well-being is substantially altered when money income is adjusted for wealth. Over the 1989-2000 period, median well-being appears to increase faster when these adjustments are made than when standard money income is used. This adjustment also widens the income gap between African Americans and whites, but increases the relative well-being of the elderly. Adding imputed rent and annuities from household wealth to household income considerably increases measured inequality and the share of income from wealth in inequality. However, both measures show about the same rise in inequality over the period. Our results contradict the assertion that the working rich have replaced the rentiers at the top of the economic ladder.

Household wealth, public consumption and economic well-being in the United States

Standard official measures of household economic well-being in several countries are based on money income. The general consensus is that such measures are limited because they ignore certain crucial determinants of well-being. We examine two such determinants--household wealth and public consumption--in the context of the US. Our findings suggest that the level and distribution of economic well-being is substantially altered when money income is adjusted for wealth or public consumption. Over the 1989-2000 period, median well-being appears to increase faster when these adjustments are made than when standard money income is used. Adding imputed rent and annuity from household wealth to household income increases measured inequality, while adding public consumption reduces it. However, all three measures show about the same rise in inequality over the period.

Household Wealth, Public Consumption, and Economic Well-Being in the United States

Standard official measures of economic well-being are based on money income. The general consensus is that such measures are seriously flawed because they ignore several crucial determinants of well-being. We examine two such determinants - household wealth and public consumption - in the context of the United States. Our findings suggest that the level and distribution of economic well-being is substantially altered when money income is adjusted for wealth or public consumption.

The Distribution of Economic Well-being in Urban Russia at the End of the Soviet Era

Assessing the extent of inequality and how various groups in the population were faring in the former Soviet Union is difficult. There are conceptual problems and severe data limitations. Here we analyse the distribution at the household level using unique microdata. The sample was collected for the Russian city Taganrog in 1989. We portray inequality in equivalent income terms, investigate income packaging, decompose inequality by population subgroups and relate equivalent income to household characteristics. The results indicate that inequality in living standards for urban Russia was small, but not extremely small. Public sector transfers and income taxes played a smaller role than in several advanced Western countries. The income situation of a household in the former Soviet Union was very strongly linked to its work efforts and dependency burden. Thus, aged persons and families with a newborn child were much worse off than people of active ages. Persons in households with a female head had considerably lower income than those with male head of households. The results also shows a clear positive relation between length of education and living-standard.

Did We Lose the War on Poverty?

Official U.S. poverty statistics based on household income imply that the proportion of the U.S. population below the poverty level reached a minimum in 1973, giving rise to the widespread impression that the elimination of poverty is impossible. By contrast, poverty estimates based on household consumption have fallen through 1989 and imply that the war on poverty was a success. This paper recommends replacing income by consumption in official estimates of poverty in order to obtain a more accurate assessment of the impact of income support programs and economic growth on the level and distribution of economic well-being among households.

The connection between public transfers and private interfamily transfers

This paper investigates the anti-poverty effectiveness of public transfers taking private-transfer responses into account. Widespread, altruistically motivated private transfers would neutralize the distributional impact of public transfers. But exchange-motivated transfers can reinforce the effects of public transfers on the distribution of economic well-being. The common technique for gauging anti-poverty effectiveness (subtracting public transfers from other income and measuring the poverty-rate counterfactual) yields results that are close to a more complex procedure that takes private-transfer responses into account. And some of the empirical findings suggest an exchange, rather than altruistic, motive for private transfers, indicating that the effects of public transfers can be magnified by private behavior. This is an exact reversal of the prediction that public transfers merely supplant private ones.

Should the Economic Life Course be Redesigned? Old Age Security in a Time of Transition

ABSTRACTThe last “great pension debate” in Canada came to an end in the early 1980s but is now about to resume. The terms of debate have changed significantly, however. As a contribution to the debate, this paper aims to identify emergent positions and the new social, economic and political conditions to which they are a response. “Conservative” strategies have emphasized privatization of the pension function and greater emphasis on providing income-tested benefits to the low income elderly. New “progressive” alternatives have advocated a redesign of the welfare state to allow for a more flexible model of retirement and the economic life course more generally. Each is a response to real changes in the fiscal capacities of governments, the conditions for successful economic performance and the distribution of economic risk among age groups. The empirical core of the paper uses data from the Survey of Consumer Finances to show how the age distribution of economic well-being has changed since the the 1960s when the current welfare state was designed. Our aim is not to resolve the debate but to set it in context and identify the main assumptions and models underlying alternative strategies for reform.

Trade and the distribution of economic well-being in an economy with local public goods

This paper models a small open economy containing many identical communities and two types of workers, who are perfectly mobile across communities, but not internationally. Competitive firms produce two tradable private goods, and local governments provide residents with a single public good. Trade patterns differ across communities in equilibrium. This observation is used to prove a modified version of the Stolper–Samuelson theorem. Simply stated, workers who are relatively concentrated in those communities that export a given good gain from a rise in the relative price of this good, whereas the other workers lose.

The Distribution of Economic Well-Being.

The Distribution of Economic Well-Being.

Canadian Farm and Nonfarm Family Incomes

Analysis of level and distribution of economic well-being in North American agriculture is, without doubt, underdeveloped and fraught with ambiguity. Bawden refers to this situation as the neglected human factor (p. 879). It stems from censuses of agriculture that are typically enterprise-oriented, problems of monitoring selfemployment incomes, incomplete income measurement, and inadequate information on increasing importance of off-farm work in family income equation. In Canada, paucity of quantitative studies on subject is highly visible. Examples of few and far between include Fitzpatrick's regional analysis of family income based on a 1958 survey; a Federal Task Force on Agriculture evaluation of low income problem using limited data on sales and capital value; Gellner and Davey's study of incomes using aggregate tax data; McClutchy and Campbell's estimates of farm family real income, using questionable 1972 Agriculture Enumerative Survey; and Kulshreshtha's 1967 measurement of farm:nonfarm incomes in historical perspective. Most of these studies are comparable in neither methodology nor empirical coverage. Absence of information on returns to off-farm work is particularly conspicuous. With exception of Kulshreshtha's work, little attempt has been made to evaluate alternative farm:nonfarm income measures, or extent to which their viability depends on context in which they are being used. These shortcomings prompted a complete linkage of Canada's 1971 Censuses of Agriculture and Population, resulting in a unique data base with a wealth of income data. Some 365,000 enterprise questionnaires (with 199 questions) have been computer matched with independently enumerated Census of Population questionnaires for respective households. One-third of latter have been enumerated on a detailed sample basis. They contain approximately sixteen detailed income and employment-related questions and cover all members of census household. The linkage was designed and performed under direction of author. For details see Shaw (1971, 1979a) and Freeman. Income questions on 1971 Census of Population pertain to 1970. Total family cash income is sum of all income earned by family members from wages and salaries, net selfemployment, nonfarm self-employment, transfer payments, interest, rent, and other. This linkage commences a new decennial series with advantage that income coverage for and nonfarm families will stem from same census methodology and will pertain to same time period. We draw on this improved source (a) to place disparities in farm:urban incomes in Canada in clearer perspective, and (b) to single out incredible impact that off-farm work is having on reducing disparities.

The Distribution of Economic Well-Being.

The Distribution of Economic Well-Being.

The Distribution of Economic Well-Being, National Bureau of Economic Research Studies in Income and Wealth, No. 41

The Distribution of Economic Well-Being, National Bureau of Economic Research Studies in Income and Wealth, No. 41

John A. Brittain. Inheritance and the Inequality of Material Wealth. The Brookings Institution Studies in Social Economics. Pp. 102. Washington, DC: The Brookings Institution, 1978. $7.95. Juster F. Thomas, ed. The Distribution of Economic Well-Being. National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc., Studies in Income and Wealth, no. 41. Pp. 679. Cambridge, MA: Ballinger Publishing, 1977

John A. Brittain. Inheritance and the Inequality of Material Wealth. The Brookings Institution Studies in Social Economics. Pp. 102. Washington, DC: The Brookings Institution, 1978. $7.95. Juster F. Thomas, ed. The Distribution of Economic Well-Being. National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc., Studies in Income and Wealth, no. 41. Pp. 679. Cambridge, MA: Ballinger Publishing, 1977

The Distribution of Economic Well-Being.

The Distribution of Economic Well-Being.