voprecotestВопросы экономикиVoprosy Ekonomiki0042-8736Voprosy Ekonomiki, NP10.32609/0042-8736-2020-4-67-106voprecotest-2627Research ArticleМЕТОДОЛОГИЯ ЭКОНОМИЧЕСКОГО АНАЛИЗАMETHODOLOGY OF ECONOMIC ANALYSISКоманда Т. Пикетти о неравенстве в России: коллекция статистических артефактовPiketty’s team on inequality in Russia: A collection of statistical artifactshttps://orcid.org/0000-0002-2312-2110КапелюшниковР. И.KapeliushnikovRostislav I.

Капелюшников Ростислав Исаакович, чл.-корр. РАН, д. э. н., гл. н. с. ИМЭМО РАН, замдиректора Центра трудовых исследований НИУ ВШЭ

Москва

Moscow

rostis@hse.ruНациональный исследовательский институт мировой экономики и международных отношений имени Е. М. Примакова Российской академии наук; Национальный исследовательский университет «Высшая школа экономики»РоссияPrimakov National Research Institute of World Economy and International Relations, RAS; Centre for Labour Market Studies, National Research University Higher School of EconomicsRussian Federation2020120420200467106Copyright © Voprosy Ekonomiki, NP, 20202020Voprosy Ekonomiki, NPVoprosy Ekonomiki, NPhttps://www.vopreco.ru/jour/about/submissions#copyrightNoticehttps://www.vopreco.ru/jour/article/view/2627

Работа посвящена критическому анализу известного исследования Ф. Новокмета, Т. Пикетти и Г. Зюкмана «От советов до олигархов», в котором Россия предстает как страна с рекордно высоким по международным меркам экономическим неравенством (коэффициент Джини по доходам 0,5—0,6). Рассматриваются основные количественные результаты, полученные командой Пикетти; обсуждаются наиболее важные методологические особенности их подхода к измерению неравенства; подробно анализируется, как они препарировали имеющиеся базы эмпирических данных. Общий вывод состоит в том, что в своих расчетах авторы используют неконвенциональную методологию, не позволяющую учитывать экономию от масштаба и применять шкалы эквивалентности; в их выкладках много методологических нестыковок (используются то одни, то другие единицы наблюдения, то одни, то другие определения доходов); они плохо понимают природу эмпирических данных, с которыми пытаются работать (модельные оценки трактуются как опросные, постналоговые данные — как доналоговые и т. д.); коэффициенты вычетов и декларирования, которые они применяют к налоговым данным, эмпирически неправдоподобны; более реалистичные показатели концентрации доходов для России примерно на треть ниже приведенных авторами и не слишком отличаются от показателей, которые можно получить, следуя конвенциональной методологии (коэффициенты Джини по доходам 0,3—0,4).

The paper provides a critical assessment of an authoritative study “From Soviets to oligarchs” (2017) on evolution of economic inequality in Russia by F. Novokmet, T. Piketty and G. Zucman where Russia is portrayed as a country with abnormally polarized income distribution by international standards. The author examines main quantitative results obtained by Piketty’s team, describes peculiar methodological features of their measuring procedure and analyzes how they dissect available empirical data sets. A general conclusion is that the trio uses an unconventional methodology that does not allow to apply equivalence scales; their argument suffers from internal inconsistencies (different units of observation and different definitions of income are used); they misunderstand the nature of data that form a base for their calculations (simulated estimates are perceived as raw survey data, post-tax incomes as pretax ones, etc.); deduction and declaration coefficients that they impose on tax data are empirically improbable; their final estimates of income inequality for Russia are higher than empirically realistic ones approximately by one third (Gini coefficients 0.5—0.6 instead of 0.3—0.4 by other researchers).

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The authors declare that there are no conflicts of interest present.