A DOMINANCE ANALYSIS OF THAILAND’S REGIONAL INCOME DISTRIBUTIONS, 1992–2000

Abstract

Dominance techniques are used to analyze and rank inequality, welfare, and poverty across regions in Thailand in the 1990s. Inference-based dominance methods are applied to consumption expenditure microdata from the Household Socio-Economic Surveys (SES) of 1992, 1994, 1996, 1998 and 2000. Attention is focused on the period immediately before and after the economic contraction of 1996–1997. Lorenz dominance is employed to assess inequality, while first-order Engel food share dominance is applied to rank welfare across time and among regions. Poverty is evaluated by comparing truncated food-share quantile functions. The evidence reveals that the economic crisis in 1997 seems to affect inequality in Bangkok (the richest region) more than the Northeast (the poorest region), and most dramatic changes occur in the North and South. Welfare in Bangkok is unambiguously higher than in other regions before and after economic contraction. In fact, the great economic contraction changes the rankings of economic well-being and poverty only in the North, South, and Northeast.

Citation

Chumrusphonlert, K., Formby, J.P. and Bishop, J.A. (2004), "A DOMINANCE ANALYSIS OF THAILAND’S REGIONAL INCOME DISTRIBUTIONS, 1992–2000", Bishop, J.A. and Amiel, Y. (Ed.) Studies on Economic Well-Being: Essays in the Honor of John P. Formby (Research on Economic Inequality, Vol. 12), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 405-441. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1049-2585(04)12017-6