UNEQUAL INEQUALITIES .1.
UNEQUAL INEQUALITIES .1.
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DOI：
10.1016/0022-0531(76)90037-5
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发表时间：
1976-01-01
影响因子：
1.6
通讯作者：
KOLM, SC
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
KOLM, SC
许多人认为减少经济不平等是社会的基本目标。然而，只要所谓的不平等没有被精确地表述出来，这些想法在很大程度上是不可操作的、毫无结果的，甚至是毫无意义的。这是因为，正如下文所述，不同的不平等衡量标准会得出截然不同甚至相反的结果。这种政策减少了一些明显合理的措施，增加了其他措施。我可以拿任何一个国家来证明在某个时期（不管是什么时期），这个国家的不平等程度是增加了还是减少了，也可以拿任何两个国家来证明其中一个国家的不平等程度比另一个国家更高，这是通过选择不同的不平等衡量标准来实现的，乍一看，所有这些都可能是好的和有价值的。此外，这种尴尬的情况不仅发生在我们考虑人们复杂的社会、社会经济或经济地位，甚至他们的消费-劳动捆绑在一段时间内甚至是永恒的时候，而且发生在最简单的情况下，即变量是一个独特的量（甚至是一个量），如收入或财富。因此，似乎有必要评估不平等措施的经济影响，如果我们敢说，道德影响，并建立体现我们认为不平等意味着的经济和道德属性的措施。几位经济学家，其中包括庇古[I]、道尔顿[2，31]、陶西格[4]、坎南[5]和洛里亚[6]，都阐述了他们关于收入的某些明确变化是增加还是减少不平等的观点：这些是不平等度量或指数的隐含属性。道尔顿还为它们添加了更具体但不太有效的结构（见[7，第VI节]）。中介绍了一些其他性质及其关系，
Many people consider the reduction of economic inequalites as a basic aim of society. Such ideas are, however, largely nonoperational, sterile, and even meaningless, as long as what is called inequality is not stated with precision. This is so because, as well appear below, different measures of inequality give widely different, and even opposite, results. Such policy which diminishes some apparently reasonable measure increases other ones. And I can take any country and prove that in some period (whatever it is) inequality has increased or decreased in it, or any two countries and prove that inequality is higher in the one or in the other, by choosing different inequality measures, all of which would probably seem good and valuable at first sight. Furthermore, this embarrassing situation happens not only when we consider the complex social, or socioeconomic, or economic position of persons, or even their consumption-labor bundles over time or even timeless, but even in the simplest case where the variable is a unique magnitude (and, even, a quantity) per person, such as its income or its wea1th. lIt thus seems essential to appraise the economic and, if we dare say, ethical, implications of the inequality measures, and to build measures embodying the economic and ethical properties we feel inequality means. Several economists, among them Pigou [I], Dalton [2, 31, Taussig [4], Cannan [5], and Loria [6], have stated their views about whether some well-defined changes in incomes increase or decrease their inequality: these are implicit properties of inequality measures or indices. Dalton also added more specific but less valid structures for them (see [7, Sect. VI]). A number of other properties and their relations were introduced in