1/OK, data mystery time.

This New York Times feature shows China with a Gini Index of less than 30, which would make it more equal than Canada, France, or the Netherlands. https://t.co/g3Sv6DZTDE

That's weird. Income inequality in China is legendary.

Let's check this number.

2/The New York Times cites the World Bank's recent report, "Fair Progress? Economic Mobility across Generations Around the World".

The report is available here: https://t.co/mrvWz1IzIe
3/The World Bank report has a graph in which it appears to show the same value for China's Gini - under 0.3.

The graph cites the World Development Indicators as its source for the income inequality data.
4/The World Development Indicators are available at the World Bank's website.

Here's the Gini index: https://t.co/MvylQzpX6A

It looks as if the latest estimate for China's Gini is 42.2.

That estimate is from 2012.
5/A Gini of 42.2 would put China in the same neighborhood as the U.S., whose Gini was estimated at 41 in 2013.

I can't find the <30 number anywhere. The only other estimate in the tables for China is from 2008, when it was estimated at 42.8.
6/FRED, which gets its Gini estimates from the World Bank, shows the same numbers: https://t.co/1y911qazo9

Everyone except the "Fair Progress?" report, and the New York Times feature, seems to agree that the World Bank's most recent estimate of China's Gini is 42.2.
7/It appears that China's own estimate of its Gini was 46.5 in 2016: https://t.co/dG58kH3LiS
8/So where the heck is the "Fair Progress?" report getting its super-low China Gini number? It seems like it's NOT from the World Bank's World Development Indicators, which is what the report cites.
9/I notice that in the "Fair Progress?" report cited by the NYT, the U.S. Gini is also a bit fishy. It's less than 40, when the World Development Indicators say it's a bit over 40.
10/The only other source the "Fair Progress?" report cites is the World Bank's Global Database on Intergenerational Mobility: https://t.co/95RnPYxMsB

But the GDIM doesn't have income GINIs. So that can't be where these weird numbers were from (unless the data was mislabeled).
11/Anyway I've been searching high and low for where the "Fair Progress?" report and the NYT got these weird Gini numbers, and I just can't find it. If anyone else can help me find where this comes from, I'd appreciate it.
12/As of right now, it's looking like the New York Times used some bad data for an incredibly widely read report, thus convincing a ton of people (incorrectly) that China is a far more economically equal place than the United States.

https://t.co/vmzz57YeFf
13/But if someone finds a reliable source for these Gini numbers, then please let me know!

(end...for now)
14/UPDATE: The mystery has been solved! https://t.co/Qw9aB7Qg9D

The Gini number the NYT used was from the 1980s. It was not labeled as such.
15/The people who wrote the New York Times story appeared not to realize this. Here's the caption and graph from their piece:
16/The NYT seems to have just made a mistake, and should change the text and the graph to reflect that these numbers are from the 1980s, not current.

(end)

More from Noah Smith

When Republicans started to believe in racial bloc voting - when they stopped believing that nonwhite people could ever be persuaded to vote Republican - they started to see immigration as an invasion.

This explains why immigration is now at the center of partisan conflict.


Of course, the belief in ethnic bloc voting becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

When a slight Dem tilt among Hispanics and Asians caused the GOP to turn against them, Hispanics and Asians shifted more toward the Dems. Etc. etc. A self-reinforcing cycle.

Bush's 2006 amnesty attempt, and the 2013 intra-GOP fight over immigration reform, were two moments when the GOP could have turned back to the approach of Reagan, and courted Hispanics and Asians.

But they decided against this, and...here we are.

What will disrupt this bad equilibrium, and save American politics from being an eternal race war?

Either:
A) More white voters will grow disgusted with the GOP approach and defect, or
B) The GOP will find some non-immigration-related issues to attract more Hispanics and Asians.

As long as both parties see elections in terms of racial bloc voting - where the only way to win is to increase turnout among your own racial blocs or suppress turnout by the other party's racial blocs - American politics will not improve, and the country will decline.

(end)

More from Society

This is a piece I've been thinking about for a long time. One of the most dominant policy ideas in Washington is that policy should, always and everywhere, move parents into paid labor. But what if that's wrong?

My reporting here convinced me that there's no large effect in either direction on labor force participation from child allowances. Canada has a bigger one than either Romney or Biden are considering, and more labor force participation among women.

But what if that wasn't true?

Forcing parents into low-wage, often exploitative, jobs by threatening them and their children with poverty may be counted as a success by some policymakers, but it’s a sign of a society that doesn’t value the most essential forms of labor.

The problem is in the very language we use. If I left my job as a New York Times columnist to care for my 2-year-old son, I’d be described as leaving the labor force. But as much as I adore him, there is no doubt I’d be working harder. I wouldn't have stopped working!

I tried to render conservative objections here fairly. I appreciate that @swinshi talked with me, and I'm sorry I couldn't include everything he said. I'll say I believe I used his strongest arguments, not more speculative ones, in the piece.

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Хајде да направимо мали осврт на случај Мика Алексић .

Алексић је жртва енглеске освете преко Оливере Иванчић .
Мика је одбио да снима филм о блаћењу Срба и мењању историје Срба , иза целокупног пројекта стоји дипломатски кор Британаца у Београду и Оливера Иванчић


Оливера Илинчић је иначе мајка једне од његових ученица .
Која је претила да ће се осветити .

Мика се налази у притвору због наводних оптужби глумице Милене Радуловић да ју је наводно силовао човек од 70 година , са три бајпаса и извађеном простатом пре пет година

Иста персона је и обезбедила финансије за филм преко Беча а филм је требао да се бави животом Десанке Максимовић .
А сетите се и ко је иницирао да се Десанка Максимовић избаци из уџбеника и школства у Србији .

И тако уместо романсиране верзије Десанке Максимовић утицај Британаца

У Србији стави на пиједестал и да се Британци у Србији позитивно афирмишу како би се на тај начин усмерила будућност али и мењао ток историје .
Зато Мика са гнушањем и поносно одбија да снима такав филм тада и почиње хајка и претње која потиче из британских дипломатских кругова

Најгоре од свега што је то Мика Алексић изговорио у присуству високих дипломатских представника , а одговор је био да се све неће на томе завршити и да ће га то скупо коштати .
Нашта им је Мика рекао да је он свој живот проживео и да могу да му раде шта хоће и силно их извређао