Minor Concentration Ratios for the Bounds of the Gini Index

Abstract

The minor concentration ratio is used to supplement the Gini index in income distribution studies. The appeal of the minor concentration ratio stems form the fact that it examines the relative position of the “poor”, an important focus group in the analysis of income distributions. In this note, minor concentration ratios associated with the lower and upper bounds of the Gini index are derived based on the observed points of the Lorenz curve. When the two minor concentration ratios are computed using grouped data for the United States, they turn out to be fairly close.