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5 - How Can Economists Help Human Rights Practitioners to Measure Changes in Economic Inequalities?

from Part I - Conceptualizing and Measuring Human Rights and Economic Inequalities

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 September 2021

By
Catherine Porter
Edited by
Gillian MacNaughton ,
Diane Frey  and
Catherine Porter
Gillian MacNaughton
Affiliation:
University of Massachusetts, Boston
Diane Frey
Affiliation:
San Francisco State University
Catherine Porter
Affiliation:
Lancaster University
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Summary

This chapter discusses the measurement of economic inequality with the aim of furthering the discussion and potential cooperation between economists and human rights scholars and practitioners. It discusses how to measure economic inequality in the most useful way for the purpose of monitoring progress towards the goal of ensuring dignity and human rights for all. This builds on the work of many other economists (see Atkinson 2015 for a comprehensive review) to seek common ground in understanding the measurement of economic inequality, to be relevant for purposes of policymaking, and discusses new work by economists that improves the measurement of income and wealth, including of the richest. Reddy (2011) argued that economics and human rights approaches can be complementary if sufficient dialogue can be created between the disciplines. In the context of the extreme and growing economic inequalities in the world today, such dialogue has become an urgent matter.

Type
Chapter
Information
Human Rights and Economic Inequalities , pp. 115 - 140
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2021

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