This paper develops a theory and methodology for estimation of Gini index such that both cost of sampling and estimation error are minimum. Methods in which sample size is fixed in advance, cannot minimize estimation error and sampling cost at the same time. In this article, a purely sequential procedure is proposed which provides an estimate of the sample size required to achieve a sufficiently smaller estimation error and lower sampling cost. Characteristics of the purely sequential procedure are examined and asymptotic optimality properties are proved without assuming any specific distribution of the data. Performance of our method is examined through extensive simulation study.
In this paper we will show that the Gini coefficient and the introduced measure of angular inequality are special cases of a wider indexed family of measurements. We will discuss the properties of the defined class based, inter alia, on a new elementary characterization of the Gini coefficient.
Gini index is a widely used measure of economic inequality. This article develops a general theory for constructing a confidence interval for Gini index with a specified confidence coefficient and a specified width. Fixed sample size methods cannot simultaneously achieve both the specified confidence coefficient and specified width. We develop a purely sequential procedure for interval estimation of Gini index with a specified confidence coefficient and a fixed margin of error. Optimality properties of the proposed method, namely first order asymptotic efficiency and asymptotic consistency are…
The aim of this paper is to establish the asymptotic behavior of the mutual influence of the Gini index and the poverty measures by using the Gaussian fields described in Mergane and Lo(2013). The results are given as representation theorems using the Gaussian fields of the unidimensional or the bidimensional functional Brownian bridges. Such representations, when combined with those already available, lead to joint asymptotic distributions with other statistics of interest like growth, welfare and inequality indices and then, unveil interesting results related to the mutual influence between …
The Gini index underestimates inequality for heavy-tailed distributions: for example, a Pareto distribution with exponent 1.5 (which has infinite variance) has the same Gini index as any exponential distribution (a mere 0.5). This is because the Gini index is relatively robust to extreme observations: while a statistic's robustness to extremes is desirable for data potentially distorted by outliers, it is misleading for heavy-tailed distributions, which inherently exhibit extremes. We propose an alternative inequality index: the variance normalized by the second moment. This ratio is more stab…
The simple linear model $$Y_i = α+ β\, x_i + ε_i \qquad i=1,2, \ldots,N \geq 2$$ is considered, where the $x_i$'s are given constants and $ε_1, ε_2 , \ldots, ε_N$ are iid with continuous distribution function $F$. An estimator of $β$ is proposed, based on Gini's rank association coefficient $G(\underline y;b)$ and defined as $\tildeβ = \frac 12 \, \left\{ \sup (b: G(\underline y;b) >0) + \right. $ $ \left. \inf (b: G(\underline y;b) <0) \right\}.$ The properties of $\tildeβ$ and of the related confidence interval are studied. Some comparisons are given, in terms of asymptotic relative efficien…
We study the problems related to the estimation of the Gini index in presence of a fat-tailed data generating process, i.e. one in the stable distribution class with finite mean but infinite variance (i.e. with tail index $α\in(1,2)$). We show that, in such a case, the Gini coefficient cannot be reliably estimated using conventional nonparametric methods, because of a downward bias that emerges under fat tails. This has important implications for the ongoing discussion about economic inequality. We start by discussing how the nonparametric estimator of the Gini index undergoes a phase transiti…
Given many popular functional forms for the Lorenz curve do not have a closed-form expression for the Gini index and no study has utilized the observed Gini index to estimate parameter(s) associated with the corresponding parametric functional form, a simple method for estimating the Lorenz curve is introduced. It utilizes 3 indicators, namely, the Gini index and the income shares of the bottom and the top in order to calculate the values of parameters associated with the specified functional form which has a closed-form expression for the Gini index. No error minimization technique is require…
To simultaneously overcome the limitation of the Gini index in that it is less sensitive to inequality at the tails of income distribution and the limitation of the inter-decile ratios that ignore inequality in the middle of income distribution, an inequality index is introduced. It comprises three indicators, namely, the Gini index, the income share held by the top 10%, and the income share held by the bottom 10%. The data from the World Bank database and the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development Income Distribution Database between 2005 and 2015 are used to demonstrate how t…
The Gini index signals only the dispersion of the distribution and is not very sensitive to income differences at the tails of the distribution. The widely used index of inequality can be adjusted to also measure distributional asymmetry by attaching weights to the distances between the Lorenz curve and the 45-degree line. The measure is equivalent to the Gini if the distribution is symmetric. The alternative measure of inequality inherits good properties from the Gini but is more sensitive to changes in the extremes of the income distribution.
Currently, the high-precision estimation of nonlinear parameters such as Gini indices, low-income proportions or other measures of inequality is particularly crucial. In the present paper, we propose a general class of estimators for such parameters that take into account univariate auxiliary information assumed to be known for every unit in the population. Through a nonparametric model-assisted approach, we construct a unique system of survey weights that can be used to estimate any nonlinear parameter associated with any study variable of the survey, using a plug-in principle. Based on a rig…
