Social Welfare Analysis of Income Distributions: Ranking Income Distributions with Generalised Lorenz Curves

Bellù, Lorenzo Giovanni and Liberati, Paolo (2005): Social Welfare Analysis of Income Distributions: Ranking Income Distributions with Generalised Lorenz Curves. Published in: (1 November 2005)

Abstract

This module illustrates how Generalised Lorenz (GL) Curves can be used to identify the best income distribution on social welfare grounds, within a set of alternative income distributions generated by different policy options, in many of the cases where ordinary Lorenz curves fail to work

After illustrating some pitfalls of ordinary Lorenz Curves, a cursory presentation of the step-by-step procedure to check for Generalised Lorenz dominance and to infer welfare judgements is provided and demonstrated with some simple numerical examples. This module also points out the limitations of the GL approach whenever GL curves cross each other. In addition, it illustrates the need, in some cases, to further restrict the family of admissible Social Welfare Functions (SWF) if a unanimous consensus about the ranking of a given set of income distributions has to be obtained. References to applications in a real country case, references to complementary EASYPol modules, notes for trainers and complementary capacity building facilities, are also provided herewith.

• Item Type: MPRA Paper
• Language: English
• Keywords: social welfare analysis, income distribution, generalised lorenz curves, generalised lorenz dominance, Shorrocks’ Theorem, inequality, poverty
• Subjects: D - Microeconomics > D3 - Distribution > D31 - Personal Income, Wealth, and Their Distributions; D - Microeconomics > D6 - Welfare Economics > D61 - Allocative Efficiency ; Cost-Benefit Analysis; E - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics > E6 - Macroeconomic Policy, Macroeconomic Aspects of Public Finance, and General Outlook > E64 - Incomes Policy ; Price Policy; H - Public Economics > H5 - National Government Expenditures and Related Policies > H53 - Government Expenditures and Welfare Programs; I - Health, Education, and Welfare > I1 - Health > I18 - Government Policy ; Regulation ; Public Health; I - Health, Education, and Welfare > I3 - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty > I31 - General Welfare, Well-Being; I - Health, Education, and Welfare > I3 - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty > I32 - Measurement and Analysis of Poverty; O - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth > O2 - Development Planning and Policy > O21 - Planning Models ; Planning Policy

References

www.fao.org/easypol