Biases in cross-space comparisons through cross-time price indexes: The case of Russia

Konstantin Gluschenko ()

No 9/2006, BOFIT Discussion Papers from Bank of Finland, Institute for Economies in Transition

Abstract: Lacking data on price levels across locations (countries, national regions, etc.) for cross-space comparisons, researchers resort to local consumer price indexes (CPIs) over time to evaluate these levels. This approach unfortunately fails to specify, even generally, the exactness of such proxies. Worse, the method is silent on whether the results are consistent, at least qualitatively, with those obtained using actual price levels. This paper aims to find an answer empirically, using data across Russian regions. Through comparison of CPI-proxied price levels with direct evaluations of regional price levels (i.e. Surinov spatial price indexes and the costs of a purchasing power basket), biases that distort the qualitative pattern of inter-regional differences are identified. Cross-region distributions for real income (calculated with CPI-proxied and directly evaluated price levels) for several points in time are estimated and compared. The CPI-induced biases are found to generally overstate inter-regional disparities.

Keywords: consumer price index; spatial price index; real income; nonhomothetic prefer-ences; Russia; Russian regions (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C43 E31 P22 R19 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cis, nep-geo and nep-tra
Date: 2006-08-18
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Persistent link: http://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hhs:bofitp:2006_009

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