SFB 303 Discussion Paper No. A - 219
Author: Henninger, Christoph, and Heinz-Peter Schmitz
Title: Size Distributions of Incomes and Expenditures: Testing the Parametric
Approach
Abstract: It is common in economics to describe the size distribution of income
by a parametric function. We will fit some of the most frequently used
functional forms (Gamma, Generalized Gamma, Singh-Maddala, Lognormal and
Fisk) to the income data made available by the ESRC Data Archive at the
University of Essex. Using the Kolmogorov-Smirnov test, the data reject all
functional forms applied to the whole population. Stratifying the data into
subgroups using the criteria of household composition or the main source of
income reveals differences in the flexibilities of the parametric forms to
represent the data.
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Creation-Date: February 1989
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