A social‐psychological reconstruction of Amartya Sen’s measures of inequality and social welfare

Stark, Oded; Budziński, Wiktor

doi:10.1111/kykl.12280

Kyklos

2021

DOI: 10.1111/kykl.12280

|View full text |Cite

A social‐psychological reconstruction of Amartya Sen’s measures of inequality and social welfare

Oded Stark

Wiktor Budziński

Abstract: The Gini coefficient features prominently in Amartya Sen's 1973 and 1997 seminal work on income inequality and social welfare. We construct the Gini coefficient from social-psychological building blocks, reformulating it as a ratio between a measure of social stress and aggregate income. We

Help me understand this report

Search citation statements

Order By: Relevance

Paper Sections

Select...

Citation Types

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Year Published

2024

Publication Types

Select...

Article4

Relationship

Self Cite1

Independent3

Authors

Journals

Cited by 4 publications

References 44 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

A note on Sen’s representation of the Gini coefficient: Revision and repercussions

Stark

2024

J Econ Inequal

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Sen (1973 and 1997) presents the Gini coefficient of income inequality in a population as follows. “In any pair-wise comparison the man with the lower income can be thought to be suffering from some depression on finding his income to be lower. Let this depression be proportional to the difference in income. The sum total of all such depressions in all possible pair-wise comparisons takes us to the Gini coefficient.” (This citation is from Sen 1973, p. 8.) Sen’s verbal account is accompanied by a formula (Sen 1997, p. 31, eq. 2.8.1), which is replicated in the text of this note as equation (1). The formula yields a coefficient bounded from above by a number smaller than 1. This creates a difficulty, because the “mission” of a measure of inequality defined on the unit interval is to accord 0 to perfect equality (maximal equality) and 1 to perfect inequality (maximal inequality). In this note we show that when the Gini coefficient is elicited from a neat measure of the aggregate income-related depression of the population that consists of the people who experience income-related depression, then the obtained Gini coefficient is “well behaved” in the sense that it is bounded from above by 1. We conjecture a reason for a drawback of Sen’s definition, and we present repercussions of the usage of the “well-behaved” Gini coefficient.

show abstract

A note on Sen’s representation of the Gini coefficient: Revision and repercussions

Stark

2024

J Econ Inequal

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

An optimal allocation of asylum seekers

Stark,

Kosiorowski

2024

Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

A Note on Sen's Representation of the Gini Coefficient: Revision and Repercussions

Stark

2024

SSRN Journal

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.

Contact Info

customersupport@researchsolutions.com

10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614

Henderson, NV 89052, USA

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Blog Terms and Conditions API Terms Privacy Policy Contact Cookie Preferences Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information

Made with 💙 for researchers

Part of the Research Solutions Family.

A social‐psychological reconstruction of Amartya Sen’s measures of inequality and social welfare

Cited by 4 publications

References 44 publications

A note on Sen’s representation of the Gini coefficient: Revision and repercussions

A note on Sen’s representation of the Gini coefficient: Revision and repercussions

An optimal allocation of asylum seekers

A Note on Sen's Representation of the Gini Coefficient: Revision and Repercussions

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About