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Ethical indices of income mobility

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Abstract

Ethical indices of income mobility measure the change in welfare resulting from mobility. The concept of mobility we explore consists of a welfare comparison between the actual time path of the income distribution with a hypothetical time path obtained by supposing that starting from the actual first-period distribution, the remaining income receipts exhibit complete immobility.

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We wish to thank C. Blackorby, M. King, J. Mirrlees, A. Shorrocks, our referees, and the participants in seminars at the California Institute of Technology, Texas A. and M. University, the University of British Columbia, the University of California at San Diego, and the 1983 Summer Econometric Society Meetings at Northwestern University for their comments. We are particularly indebted to P. Honohan for comments which led to the discovery of an error in a previous draft of this manuscript.

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Chakravarty, S.R., Dutta, B. & Weymark, J.A. Ethical indices of income mobility. Soc Choice Welfare 2, 1–21 (1985). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00433763

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