Decomposition of Inequality of Opportunity in India: An Application of Data-Driven Machine Learning Approach
Tóm tắt
This paper introduces a novel measure of inequality of opportunity (IOp) in India, by comparing both ex-ante and ex-post results, which aligns with Roemer’s (1998) equality of opportunity, theory. The study utilizes data-driven machine learning algorithms, namely conditional inference tree and conditional inference forest, to measure ex-ante IOp, and a transformation tree to estimate ex-post IOp. The findings indicate that, according to the ex-ante approach, approximately 58–61 percent of the overall income inequality can be attributed to variations in circumstances, while around 46 percent of the overall income inequality is explained by differences in the degree of efforts. The results from the tree-based analysis reveal that parents’ occupation, sector (rural–urban areas), and geographical regions are the primary circumstances contributing to IOp, which is further confirmed by the Shapley decomposition exercise. Specifically, individuals residing in rural areas in the eastern and central parts of the country, whose parents are employed in low-skilled and unskilled occupations, and have below secondary and no formal education, and who belong to marginalized social groups, exhibit significantly lower average income. Consequently, it is crucial to implement regional-level development policies that specifically target marginalized groups in order to foster a more equitable society and mitigate overall income inequality.
Tài liệu tham khảo
Anand, I., & A. Thampi. 2016. Recent trends in wealth inequality in India. 51(50). https://www.epw.in/journal/2016/50/special-articles/recent-trends-wealth-inequality-india.html
Arneson, R. 1989. Equality and equal opportunity for welfare. Philosophical Studies 56 (1): 77–93.
Asadullah, M.N., and G. Yalonetzky. 2012. Inequality of educational opportunity in India: Changes over time and across states. World Development 40 (6): 1151–1163. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.worlddev.2011.11.008.
Bourguignon, F. 2004. The poverty-growth-inequality triangle. Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations Working Paper, 131, 35.
Brunori, P., & Neidhofer, G. (2020). The Evolution of Inequality of Opportunity in Germany: A Machine Learning Approach. 53.
Brunori, P., and G. Neidhöfer. 2021b. The evolution of inequality of opportunity in Germany: A machine learning approach. Review of Income and Wealth 67 (4): 900–927. https://doi.org/10.1111/roiw.12502.
Brunori, P., P. Hufe, and D.G. Mahler. 2018. The Roots of Inequality: Estimating Inequality of Opportunity from Regression Trees. https://doi.org/10.1596/1813-9450-8349.
Brunori, P., F. Palmisano, and V. Peragine. 2019. Inequality of opportunity in sub-Saharan Africa. Applied Economics 51 (60): 6428–6458. https://doi.org/10.1080/00036846.2019.1619018.
Brunori, P., and G. Neidhöfer. 2021a. Inequality of opportunity in comparative perspective: Recent advances and challenges. In Handbook of income distribution (Vol. 3B, pp. 1393–1479). Elsevier.
Brunori, P., Ferreira, F., & Neidhöfer, G. (2023). UNU-WIDER: Working Paper : Inequality of opportunity and intergenerational persistence in Latin America [Working Paper]. UNU_Wider. http://www.wider.unu.edu/publication/inequality-opportunity-and-intergenerational-persistence-latin-america
Chancel, L., & Piketty, T. (2017). Indian income inequality, 1922–2015: From British Raj to billionaire Raj(Working Paper Series No. 2007/11). Paris: World Inequality Database (WID).
Chancel, L., and T. Piketty. 2019. Indian income inequality, 1922–2015: From British Raj to Billionaire Raj? Review of Income and Wealth 65 (S1): S33–S62. https://doi.org/10.1111/roiw.12439.
Chancel, L., T. Piketty, E. Saez, and G. Zucman. 2022. World inequality report 2022. UNDP, World Inequality Lab.
Checchi, D., and V. Peragine. 2010. Inequality of opportunity in Italy. The Journal of Economic Inequality 8 (4): 429–450. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10888-009-9118-3.
Choudhary, A., G.T. Muthukkumaran, and A. Singh. 2019. Inequality of Opportunity in Indian Women. Social Indicators Research 145 (1): 389–413. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11205-019-02097-w.
Cohen, G.A. 1989. On the currency of egalitarian justice. Ethics, 99(4), 906–944.
Das, P., and S. Biswas. 2022. Social identity, gender and unequal opportunity of earning in urban India: 2017–2018 to 2019–2020. Indian Journal of Labour Economics 65 (1): 39–57.
Deaton, A., & A.A. Stone. 2013. Grandpa and the snapper: The wellbeing of the elderly who live with children, Working Paper No. 19100. National Bureau of Economic Research. https://doi.org/10.3386/w19100
Deshpande, A., D. Goel, and S. Khanna. 2018. Bad Karma or Discrimination? Male-Female Wage Gaps Among Salaried Workers in India. World Development 102: 331–344. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.worlddev.2017.07.012.
Dworkin, R. 1981a. What is equality? Part 1: Equality of welfare. Philosophy & Public Affairs 10 (3): 185–246.
Dworkin, R. 1981b. What is equality? Part 2: Equality of resources. Philosophy & Public Affairs 10(4), 283–345.
Farouki, R.T. 2012. The Bernstein Polynomial Basis: A Centennial Retrospective. Computer Aided Geometric Design 29: 379–419.
Ferreira, F.H.G., and J. Gignoux. 2011. The measurement of inequality of opportunity: Theory and an application to Latin America. Review of Income and Wealth 57 (4): 622–657. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1475-4991.2011.00467.x.
Ferreira, F.H.G., and J. Gignoux. 2014. The Measurement of Educational Inequality: Achievement and Opportunity1. The World Bank Economic Review 28 (2): 210–246. https://doi.org/10.1093/wber/lht004.
Ferreira, F., and V. Peragine. 2015. Equality of Opportunity: Theory and Evidence, 8994. No: IZA Discussion Papers.
Fleurbaey, M. 1995. Equal opportunity or equal social outcome? Economics and Philosophy 11 (1): 25–55.
Fleurbaey, M. 2008. Fairness, responsibility, and welfare. Oxford University Press.
Fleurbaey, M., and V. Pergaine. 2013. Ex post inequalities and ex ante inequalities. In Justice, political liberalism, and utilitarianism: Themes from Harsanyi and Rawls, 59–77. Cambridge University Press.
Ghose, A.K. 2021. Structural change and development in India. Indian Journal of Human Development 15 (1): 7–29. https://doi.org/10.1177/09737030211005496.
Hothorn, T., and A. Zeileis. 2015. partykit: A modular toolkit for recursive partytioning in R. Journal of Machine Learning Research 16 (118): 3905–3909.
Hothorn, T., and A. Zeileis. 2021. Predictive distribution modeling using transformation forests. Journal of Computational and Graphical Statistics 30 (4): 1181–1196. https://doi.org/10.1080/10618600.2021.1872581.
Hothorn, T., K. Hornik, and A. Zeileis. 2006. Unbiased recursive partitioning: A conditional inference framework. Journal of Computational and Graphical Statistics 15 (3): 651–674. https://doi.org/10.1198/106186006X133933.
Hothorn, T. 2018. Video: Torsten hothorn. Transformation Forests. http://www.birs.ca/events/2018/5-day-workshops/18w5054/videos/watch/201801161507-Hothorn.html
Hufe, P., A. Peichl, J. Roemer, and M. Ungerer. 2017. Inequality of income acquisition: The role of childhood circumstances. Social Choice and Welfare 49 (3/4): 499–544.
Institute for Human Development, New Delhi. (2014). India Labour and Employment Report, 2014: Workers in the Era of Globalization. Academic Foundation.
James, G., Witten, D., Hastie, T., & Tibshirani, R. (2013). An Introduction to Statistical Learning: With Applications in R. Springer. https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-1-0716-1418-1
Kuznets, S. 1955. Economic growth and income inequality. The American Economic Review 45 (1): 1–28.
Leblanc, A. 2012. On estimating distribution functions using Bernstein polynomials. Annals of the Institute of Statistical Mathematics 64 (5): 919–943.
Lefranc, A., and T. Kundu. n.d. Inequality of opportunity in Indian society. 37.
Motiram, S. 2018. Inequality of Opportunity in India: Concepts, Measurement and Empirics. Indian Journal of Human Development 12 (2): 236–247. https://doi.org/10.1177/0973703018792646.
Piketty, T. 2011. On the long-run evolution of inheritance: France 1820–2050. The Quarterly Journal of Economics 126 (3): 1071–1131.
Piketty, T., and G. Zucman. 2015. Wealth and inheritance in the long run. In Handbook of income distribution, vol. 2, ed. A.B. Atkinson and F. Bourguignon, 1303–1368. Elsevier. https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-444-59429-7.00016-9.
Plassot, M., X. Ramos, and D. Van de Gaer. 2022. The ex-ante and ex-post measurement of inequality of opportunity: A normative framework. Review of Income and Wealth 68 (1): 4–31.
Ramos, X., and Van de gaer, D. 2016. Approaches to Inequality of Opportunity: Principles, Measures and Evidence. Journal of Economic Surveys 30 (5): 855–883.
Ramos, X., and Van de gaer, D. 2021. Is Inequality of Opportunity Robust to the Measurement Approach? Review of Income and Wealth 67 (1): 18–36. https://doi.org/10.1111/roiw.12448.
Ravallion, M., and S. Chen. 2003. Measuring pro-poor growth. Economics Letters 78 (1): 93–99. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0165-1765(02)00205-7.
Rawls, J. 1958b. Justice as fairness. The Philosophical Review 67 (2): 164–194.
Rawls, J. 1958a. A theory of justice: Original edition. In A theory of justice. Harvard University Press. https://doi.org/10.4159/9780674042605
Rawls, J. (1971). A Theory of Justice: Original Edition. Harvard University Press. https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctvjf9z6v
Roemer, J.E. 1993. A pragmatic theory of responsibility for the egalitarian planner. Philosophy & Public Affairs 22 (2): 146–166.
Roemer, J.E. 1998. Equality of opportunity. Harvard University Press, Cambridge. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-95121-5_2223-1.
Roemer, J.E. 2002. Equality of opportunity: A progress report. Social Choice and Welfare 19 (2): 455–471.
Roemer, J.E., and A. Trannoy. 2016. Equality of opportunity: Theory and measurement. Journal of Economic Literature 54 (4): 1288–1332. https://doi.org/10.1257/jel.20151206.
Salas-Rojo, P., and J.G. Rodríguez. 2022. Inheritances and wealth inequality: A machine learning approach. The Journal of Economic Inequality 20 (1): 27–51.
Sen, A. 1980. Equality of what? In Tanner lectures on human values (Vol. 1). Cambridge University Press.
Singh, A. (2012). Inequality Of Opportunity in India. 26.
Shapley, L. S. (1953). A value for n-person games. Princeton University Press Princeton.
Tagade, N., Naik, A., & Thorat, S. (2018). Wealth Ownership and Inequality in India: A Socio-religious Analysis. Journal of Social Inclusion Studies, 4(2). https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/2394481118808107
Van de gaer. 1993. Equality of Opportunity and Investment in Human Capital. Kath: Univ.
Weisskopf, T.E. 2011. Why Worry about Inequality in the Booming Indian Economy? Economic and Political Weekly 46 (47): 41–51.
Wendelspiess, F., and I. Soloaga. 2014. Iop: Estimating ex-ante inequality of opportunity. The Stata Journal 14 (4): 830–846.