A simple way to calculate the Gini Coefficient for grouped as well as ungrouped data

Abstract

Numerous methods have been proposed for calculating the Gini coefficient, the most widely used statistical measure of income inequality. The Milanovic (Bulletin of Economic Research, 46, 81-90, 1994) measure is simple, accurate and has attractive decomposition properties. However its use is confined to ungrouped data. This paper derives and applies the analogue of the Milanovic 94 measure for the case of grouped data. Both the grouped and ungrouped formulae offer a useful toolkit for inequality measurement.