An AHPSort II Based Analysis of the Inequality Reduction within European Union

Abstract

Nowadays, sustainability is an omnipresent concept in our society, which encompasses several challenges related to poverty, inequality, climate change and so on. The United Nations adopted the Agenda 2030, a plan of action formed of universal Sustainable Developments Goals (SDGs) and targets, which countries have to face in order to shift the world toward a sustainable future. One of the most relevant SDGs since the onset of the financial crisis in 2007 has been the so-called reduced inequalities, which consists of dealing with the inequality of opportunities and wealth between and within countries. However, reducing inequalities depends on many heterogeneous aspects, making it difficult to make a proper analysis that evaluates the European Union (EU) countries performance of this goal. In this study, we introduce a novel approach to evaluate the inequalities in EU countries based on a sorting a multi-criteria decision-making method called AHPSort II. This approach allows to obtain a classification of the EU countries according to their achievements in reducing inequalities to subsequently carry out a deep performance analysis with the aim of drawing conclusions as to the evolution of inequality in them along the years. The results are consistent with the main international organizations’ reports and academic literature, as shown in the Discussion Section.

Multi-stage Internet public opinion risk grading analysis of public health emergencies: An empirical study on Microblog in COVID-19

“…As an extension of the AHPSort method, AHPSort II has fewer comparison times, more convenient usage, more accurate results, and its effectiveness has been verified ( Xie et al, 2019 ). Labella et al (2020) used AHPSort II to assess the performance of EU countries to reduce inequality. Xu et al (2019) combined interval type-2 fuzzy sets (IT2FSs) with AHPSort II to show a new supply chain management method, which is proved to have higher priority accuracy than traditional methods.…”

Multiple Criteria Decision Making for the Achievement of the UN Sustainable Development Goals: A Systematic Literature Review and a Research Agenda

“…Their evaluation showed that the proposed mixed strategy portfolio for green aviation fleet management could be determined using limited resources. Some authors concentrated their efforts on selecting or ranking strategies to make the infrastructure sector more sustainable [81,87,[89][90][91][92][93][94].…”

“…Table 9 presents the contributions of MCDM methods related to this category [94,95]. Labella et al [94] developed a novel approach to evaluate the inequalities in the European Union (EU) countries based on a compromise method (AHPSort II).…”

“…Table 9 presents the contributions of MCDM methods related to this category [94,95]. Labella et al [94] developed a novel approach to evaluate the inequalities in the European Union (EU) countries based on a compromise method (AHPSort II). This methodological approach allowed the authors to obtain a classification of the EU countries according to their achievements in reducing inequalities to subsequently carry out an in-depth performance analysis to conclude as to the evolution of inequality in them over the years.…”

Application of the Kernel Density Function for the Analysis of Regional Growth and Convergence in the Service Sector through Productivity

“…In an international context, the literature on growth and convergence is extensive [26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35]. According to Willington [36], following Baumol [23], empirical evidence on this subject has expanded rapidly, with new criticisms emerging, both theoretical and empirical, while proposing new alternative estimation methods.…”