The Gini Methodology

Introduction.- More Than a Dozen Alternative Ways of Spelling Gini.- The Gini equivalents of the covariance, the correlation and the regression coefficient.- Decompositions of the GMD.- The Lorenz curve and the concentration curve.- The extended Gini family of measures.- Gini Simple Regressions.- Multiple Regressions.- Inference on Gini-based parameters -estimation.- Inference on Gini-based parameters -testing.- Inference on Lorenz and on Concentration curves.- Introduction to applications.- Social welfare, relative deprivation and the Gini coefficient.- Policy Analysis.- Policy Analysis Using the Decomposition of the Gini by non-marginal analysis.- Incorporating poverty in Policy Analysis - the Marginal Analysis case.- Introduction to applications of the GMD and the Lorenz curve in finance.- The mean-Gini portfolio and the pricing of capital assets.- Applications of Gini methodology in regression analysis.- Gini's multiple regressions: two approaches and their interaction.- Mixed OLS, Gini and extended Gini regressions.- An application in statistics - ANOGI.- Suggestions for further research

Shlomo Yitzhaki received his B.A. in Economics and Statistics from The Hebrew University, and his M.A. in Economics Cum Laude and Ph.D. from The Hebrew University. He is currently Government Statistician at the Central Bureau of Statistics, Israel and Professor Emeritus, Dept. of Economics, at the Hebrew University, Jerusalem. Shlomo Yitzhaki was the recipient of the annual prize of the Israeli Data Processing Association in 1974 for the construction of a Tax Model. Besides significant public appointments with the Israeli government, he was a consutant at the World Bank and held visiting scholar positions at Harvard University, Falk Institute, and the Hoover Institution. Shlomo Yitzhaki has served on the board of many prominent economic journals including: Economics Bulletin, National Tax Journal, The Journal of Economic Inequality, Review of Income and Wealth, and European Journal of Political Economy.

Edna Schechtman received a B.Sc. in Mathematics and Statistics, Hebrew University of Jerusalem (1971); M.A. in Statistics, Hebrew university (1976); Ph.D. in Statistics, Ohio State University (1980). She is a professor of Statistics at Ben Gurion University, Israel. Her main research interests are in the field of measures based on the Gini index as well as in applied Statistics in various areas such as medicine, road safety, quality control and more. She published over 100 papers in the professional literature. Professor Schechtman was the president of the Israeli Statistical Association. She recently spent 6 months at Stern business school at NYU and one semester at the department of Statistics at Berkeley as a visiting scholar and is a frequent visitor of the department of Statistics at Texas A&M university.

From the reviews:

"The book The Gini methodology by S. Yitzhaki and E. Schechtman is based on Gini's Mean Deviation (GMD) and the methodology based on it. ... To a student acquainted with the usual methods of statistics, the book provides an interesting alternative technique which makes for very good reading. Even at an advanced level, it provides a refreshing perspective through which the traditional methods can examined." (Sugata Sen Roy, Mathematical Reviews, February, 2014)

"In recent decades we have seen a growing interest of scholars of different cultural background on the results and problems related to Corrado Gini's scientific production and in particular on the mean difference (GMD) and his famous "concentration ratio" also known as Gini inequality index or Gini coefficient (GI). Now, these scholars have a fresh and clear source from which to draw information and ideas to satiate their thirst for knowledge by reading the very interesting and stimulating book "The Gini methodology: a primer on a statistical methodology" authored by Shlomo Yitzhaki and Edna Schechtman and published in January 2013 by Springer.

It is a book that addresses the theoretical, methodological and applicative aspects related to a set of measures based on the GMD and the GI. The book proposes solutions, but also invites to make further analysis, to address problems not yet resolved, to find alternatives to some aspects not yet fully analyzed and to suggest new applications." -- (Giovanni Maria Giorgi, Metron, Vol. 71 (2) 2013)

"This book represents a useful primer on the Gini methodology area. It is recommended to all readers who are interested in learning more about econometrics and welfare economics, particularly Gini regressions, Gini-based parameters, inference purposes with many empirical applications." (Ndéné Ka and Stéphane Mussard, The Journal of Economic Inequality, Vol. 13, 2015)

"The book The Gini methodology by S. Yitzhaki and E. Schechtman is based on Gini's Mean Deviation (GMD) and the methodology based on it. ... To a student acquainted with the usual methods of statistics, the book provides an interesting alternative technique which makes for very good reading. Even at an advanced level, it provides a refreshing perspective through which the traditional methods can examined." (Sugata Sen Roy, Mathematical Reviews, February, 2014)

"In recent decades we have seen a growing interest of scholars of different cultural background on the results and problems related to Corrado Gini's scientific production and in particular on the mean difference (GMD) and his famous "concentration ratio" also known as Gini inequality index or Gini coefficient (GI). Now, these scholars have a fresh and clear source from which to draw information and ideas to satiate their thirst for knowledge by reading the very interesting and stimulating book "The Gini methodology: a primer on a statistical methodology" authored by Shlomo Yitzhaki and Edna Schechtman and published in January 2013 by Springer.
It is a book that addresses the theoretical, methodological and applicative aspects related to a set of measures based on the GMD and the GI. The book proposes solutions, but also invites to make further analysis, to address problems not yet resolved, to find alternatives to some aspects not yet fully analyzed and to suggest new applications."

(Giovanni Maria Giorgi, Metron, Vol. 71 (2) 2013)