eprintid: 15166 rev_number: 29 eprint_status: archive userid: 600 dir: disk0/00/01/51/66 datestamp: 2009-04-21 14:55:44 lastmod: 2015-07-23 09:36:41 status_changed: 2009-04-21 14:55:44 type: working_paper metadata_visibility: show item_issues_count: 0 creators_name: Attanasio, O. creators_name: Battistin, E. creators_name: Ichimura, H. creators_id: OPATT42 creators_id: HICHI25 title: What really happened to consumption inequality in the US? ispublished: pub subjects: 12000 divisions: F24 keywords: JEL classification: E21, E26 abstract: This paper considers data quality issues for the analysis of consumption inequality exploiting two complementary datasets from the Consumer Expenditure Survey for the United States. The Interview sample follows survey households over four calendar quarters and consists of retrospectively collected information about monthly expenditures on durable and non-durable goods. The Diary sample interviews household for two consecutive weeks and includes detailed information about frequently purchased items (food, personal cares and household supplies). Most reliable information from each sample is exploited to derive a correction for the measurement error affecting observed measures of consumption inequality in the two surveys. We find that consumption inequality, as measured by the standard deviation of log non-durable consumption, has increased by roughly 5% points during the 1990s. date: 2004-03 publisher: National Bureau of Economic Research official_url: http://www.nber.org/papers/w10338 vfaculties: VSHS oa_status: green language: eng primo: open primo_central: open_green lyricists_name: Attanasio, O lyricists_id: OPATT42 full_text_status: public series: NBER Working Papers number: 10338 place_of_pub: Cambridge, US citation: Attanasio, O.; Battistin, E.; Ichimura, H.; (2004) What really happened to consumption inequality in the US? (NBER Working Papers 10338). National Bureau of Economic Research: Cambridge, US. Green open access document_url: https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/15166/1/15166.pdf