Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Sensitivity Of Turkish Income Distributions To Choice Of Equivalence Scale, Sinem Sefil

Topics in Middle Eastern and North African Economies

Income surveys are typically designed to collect income data on the household level. In order to obtain reliable outcomes from income distribution and inequality analysis, it is of crucial importance to consider households’ composition and varying needs. Relying on data from Turkey’s 2009-2011 Income and Living Conditions Survey (SILC), this paper examines the GE class inequality indices and Gini coefficient in terms of their sensitivity to choice of equivalence scales. It uses both one-parameter and two-parameter parametric equivalence scales to capture the effects of household size and decomposition. Following Coulter et al. (1992a), this study tests the sensitivity of the …