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I am not so sure about the validity of that graph. Even a quick google search search provides http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/calculator.cms http://timesofin

I am not so sure about the validity of that graph. Even a quick google search search provides http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/calculator.cms http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/calculator.cms which is also from 2011. 8500 dollars (the cutoff for the bottom 5% of the US according to http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2012/01/15/business/one-percent-map.html http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2012/01/15/business/one-p...) a year gives a person in the top 16% of India. But this is without any adjustment whatsoever. And I checked, the calculator is in terms of USD not INR according to the survey it comes from. The other argument to consider is how much India's top ventile has increased by compared to the bottom ventile of the US since 2011. Just by economic growth numbers it would have relatively increased. If you can provide what your article's base income numbers were and how they adjusted them to get the graph, it would be much more convincing.

yummyfajitas 10y ago
This is probably a good primer: http://siteresources.worldbank.org/INTPOVRES/Resources/477227-1142020443961/Module5_chap9_10.pdf http://siteresources.worldbank.org/INTPOVRES/Resources/47722... Yearly statistics on India are not very good. Realistically if you have accurate info on what happened in the past 5 years (form what I've seen, they've been great!), you should keep quiet about it and just rake in crores in the shares markets.
- steakandpeas 10y ago
  The paper you have cited not only uses data from 1998, it also splits India into rural and urban India. The passage in the paper that I can find to support you claim is as follows: "Now, consider mean income of the people belonging to the top decile or ventile, in countries ranging from rural India to Cameroon. Their income puts them between the 51th and 69th percentile of world distribution. Therefore, these two distributions, e.g. Japan’s and rural India’s, practically do not overlap. Or to give another example: a Frenchman on welfare or unemployment benefits (who would presumably belong to the bottom decile of income distribution in France) would still be better off than a top decile person in Madagascar." Note that it only talks about rural India. In fact all the charts in the paper, including the chart on top decile/ventile of poor vs bottom decile/ventile of rich on page 47 do not even include Urban India. I would be curious to see this study repeated with current numbers and without splitting India into urban and rural. Especially because of the amount of urbanization and economic growth that India has seen since 1998.
  - yummyfajitas 10y ago
    The actual source is Milanovic's book (which you'd know if you read the NYT article), but that's $12 on kindle: http://amzn.to/1VSdMU5 http://amzn.to/1VSdMU5 I spent a few minutes googling hoping to find something academic by the same author, but didn't look as carefully as I should have. But since you've called me out, I dug up my copy of the book. Apparently this paper is the original source and it uses 2005 data: https://www.gc.cuny.edu/CUNY_GC/media/CUNY-Graduate-Center/PDF/Centers/LIS/Milanovic/papers/2012/gpol_170.pdf https://www.gc.cuny.edu/CUNY_GC/media/CUNY-Graduate-Center/P... No idea where to get the most current data.

yummyfajitas 10y ago

This is probably a good primer: http://siteresources.worldbank.org/INTPOVRES/Resources/477227-1142020443961/Module5_chap9_10.pdf http://siteresources.worldbank.org/INTPOVRES/Resources/47722... Yearly statistics on India are not very good. Realistically if you have accurate info on what happened in the past 5 years (form what I've seen, they've been great!), you should keep quiet about it and just rake in crores in the shares markets.

steakandpeas 10y ago
The paper you have cited not only uses data from 1998, it also splits India into rural and urban India. The passage in the paper that I can find to support you claim is as follows: "Now, consider mean income of the people belonging to the top decile or ventile, in countries ranging from rural India to Cameroon. Their income puts them between the 51th and 69th percentile of world distribution. Therefore, these two distributions, e.g. Japan’s and rural India’s, practically do not overlap. Or to give another example: a Frenchman on welfare or unemployment benefits (who would presumably belong to the bottom decile of income distribution in France) would still be better off than a top decile person in Madagascar." Note that it only talks about rural India. In fact all the charts in the paper, including the chart on top decile/ventile of poor vs bottom decile/ventile of rich on page 47 do not even include Urban India. I would be curious to see this study repeated with current numbers and without splitting India into urban and rural. Especially because of the amount of urbanization and economic growth that India has seen since 1998.
- yummyfajitas 10y ago
  The actual source is Milanovic's book (which you'd know if you read the NYT article), but that's $12 on kindle: http://amzn.to/1VSdMU5 http://amzn.to/1VSdMU5 I spent a few minutes googling hoping to find something academic by the same author, but didn't look as carefully as I should have. But since you've called me out, I dug up my copy of the book. Apparently this paper is the original source and it uses 2005 data: https://www.gc.cuny.edu/CUNY_GC/media/CUNY-Graduate-Center/PDF/Centers/LIS/Milanovic/papers/2012/gpol_170.pdf https://www.gc.cuny.edu/CUNY_GC/media/CUNY-Graduate-Center/P... No idea where to get the most current data.