1

An evaluation of the empirical calculation methods of the Gini

coefficient
 2

I. Introduction, Aims and Rationale

Economic inequality is a persistent and pressing issue having the potency to rouse
resentment amongst a nations population, give rise to social and economic upheavals and
provoke strong arguments about its magnitude, impacts and potential solutions. I became
interested in the issue of global inequality only after witnessing varying degrees of poverty
within and between the areas of residence that have dominated my life: India (various
areas within) and Singapore. It is fascinating to see that such drastic inequalities could
exist in the small vicinity of cities as seen in the figure below.

Figure 1: India: Poverty and Affluence in the same plot of land

I was curious as to how such a crucial measure that defined various governmental policies
was calculated, withstanding the income disparity within a geographical region and the
vastness of data required for an accurate calculation in countries such as India. This led
my basic research in the area from which I discovered the prevalence of mathematics in
generalising formulae to represent economic inequality. Through the lessons in school, I
was able to recognise the basic principles behind some of these formulae which further
probed me to investigate. This is because, an additional desire of mine was to apply the
deep study we did of calculus and series in school to something more tangible and real.

As such, to understand the process of rendering mathematics pertaining to real life socio-
political situations reliable and trustworthy, I decided to focus on income inequality,
comparing various ways of calculating the Gini Coefficient (a global standard), particularly
 3

that of India. Through the investigation, I am to identify the reasons for unreliability (if any)
and to understand what a perfect measure of economic inequality would be.

II. Background Information

The Gini Coefficient is the most renowned and widely employed measure of inequality, and
is a standard in governmental calculations. It is named after its founder, Corrado Gini, who
discovered it in 1912. The value of a regions Gini Coefficient ranges between 0 and 1 and
is based on the net income of residents. Here, 0 represents perfect equality with each
resident earning the same income and 1 represents perfect inequality where 1 person
earns all of the income (Bourne). As such a higher Gini coefficient value would mean
greater disparity between the incomes of the richest and poorest earners in a particular
region.

There are a number of different ways to calculate the Gini coefficient. These include
graphical methods that involve the cumulation of various data points and frequencies such
as the Lorenz curve and more theoretical ones such as Paretos distribution function.
These are the 2 methods I will be analysing and comparing against each other.

The reliability will be on the basis of the closeness of the values extracted from each
method to the value released by the Indian government for the year 2013 which was
G=0.510 in 2013 (Nair).

Method 1: Using the Lorenz Curve: Trapezium Rule

The most common way of viewing the GINI coefficient is through the generalised Lorenz
curve.
Cumulative Proportion of Income

L0 (x) = x

210 x 1
L1 (x) =
1023

Cumulative Proportion of Population

Figure 2: The line of perfect equity and an arbitrary Lorenz curve

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In reference to Figure 2, this curve depicts the percentages of a defined population

arranged from the poorest to the richest on the horizontal ( x ) axis and the cumulative
percentage of income enjoyed by a segment of a nations population. For example,
Quintile 3 shows the cumulative percentage of income earned or wealth by the 1st, 2nd
and 3rd quintiles combined. Since 0% of the population have 0% of the income, the curve
passes through point A (0,0) and since 100% of the population enjoy all the income, the
curve passes through point B (1,1) as seen in the diagram. As such a Lorenz curve runs
from one corner of the unit square to the diagonally opposite corner. This serves as the
benchmark for a perfectly equal distribution of income indicated by the curve L0 (x) .

210 x 1
Figure 2 displays an arbitrary yet possible Lorenz curve L1 (x) = . The degree of
1023
income inequality is defined by the deviation of the Lorenz curve from the line of perfect
inequality. This deviation (Gini coefficient) is measured by the area underneath the Lorenz
curve, as we will observe.

With a Lorenz curve plot such as the one above, we can measure the Gini coefficient. The
general formula to be used in the investigation is represented by the following integral:

1
G = 2 L0(x) L(x)dx
0

This calculates the area between the curve of perfect inequality and a Lorenz curve
divided by the area under the perfect inequality curve. In Figure 1 for example, the Gini
coefficient of L1 (x) is measured as the area LA (Lorenz area) between the curve and
L0 (x) divided by the area under L0 (x) as highlight in magenta and orange respectively.
Since, at point B, the coordinates are (1,1) , this forms a right angled triangle with point A
and (1,0) being the other two vertices, which is highlighted in a light shade of orange.
1 1
Hence the area under the equity curve is the area under a triangle, which is 11 = .
2 2

As such, the Gini coefficient can be generally written as:

LA G
G= = 2LA
LA =
1/2 2

where LA is the area between the two curves mentioned above and G is the Gini
coefficient of L2 (x) , with reference to Figure 2. However, the general formula is difficult to
employ in real life situations. This is because, nations collect raw data from their
population in large numbers which may be difficult to formulate as a generalised graph. I
 5

will attempt to do this using the trapezium rule with a limited set of data acquired from the
official census data of Indias income brackets as seen in the following table.

Proportion of Proportion of
Population: Income
(converting % to (converting % to
decimals) decimals
xi yi
1 0 0
2 0.2 (first quintile) 0.061

3 0.4 (second 0.153

quintile)
4 0.6 (third quintile) 0.279

5 0.8 (fourth 0.468

quintile)
6 1 (fifth quintile) 1.0

Table 1: Cumulative frequency table depicting Indias Figure 3: Indias quintile income proportion scatter plot
income in quintiles

The trapezium rule refers to a rule of numerical integration that estimates the area under a
curve. As such, it is a way of estimating integrals of curves by segregating the area under
curve into a number of trapeziums, whose areas are then summed. To find the Gini
coefficient, the data points in Table 1 can be used to formulate a number of trapeziums to
represent an estimated Lorenz Curve, as seen in the figure below:

L0 (x) = x
Estimated L1 (x)

Figure 4: Area under an estimated Lorenz curve, formulated

with the trapezium rule
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Here, the summed area of trapeziums T1, T2, T3 and T4 and the triangle TR1 (in red)
subtracting by the area of TR0 (in green) represents the area LA. The area of TR0, the
triangle below L0 (x) is 1/2. Hence, in accordance to the formula stated above the Gini
coefficient estimated using the trapezium rule will be:

0.5 (0.01+ 0.02 + 0.04 + 0.07 + 0.15) 0.21

G= = = 0.420
0.5 0.5
This value is an great underestimation of the governmentally stated value of the coefficient
which is G=0.510. This suggests that the Trapezium rule results in the presence of a
negative bias for the calculation of the Gini coefficient, rendering it a largely ineffective
measure.
 7

Method 2: Using the Lorenz Curve: Polynomial Regression

To rectify this limitation and formulate a more accurate Lorenz curve, I will attempt to
formulate a polynomial graph using polynomial regression. This refers to a method of
curve fitting with which a set of data is approximated using a polynomial function that takes
the form f (x) = C0 + C1 x1 + C2 x 2 + ...+ Cn x n where C refers to a set of coefficients and n refers
to the degree of the polynomial function. Here, the difference between the measured value
of yi and the actual value of yi is referred to as the residual value R .

The general model for polynomial regression can be created using the method of least
squares. This method attempts to reduce the variance between the values in order to fit
the data points accurately, by finding the lowest sum of residuals. Since linear and
polynomial regression models are often unreliable, tending to inappropriately depict the
data, residuals are used to examine their accuracy. A residual (e) point refers to the
difference between the actual value of the dependent variable (y) and the value predicted
by the points on a regression curve (y1) (Finding Residuals).

This is shown graphically in the figure below:

e = y y1

Figure 5: Depiction of residual values

Here, the sum of squared residuals is represented by:

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n 2

SSR yi (C0 + C1 xi + ...+ Cn xin )

i=1

In order to minimise the polynomial we take partial derivatives of this function with respect
to each of the constants ( C ), where we equate the residual to 0 to find the lowest value of
SR (sum of residuals). Partial derivatives refer to derivatives of a function with multiple
variables, where all the variables except C are held to be fixed (Weisstein).

To find the Lorenz curve of India, I will restrict the investigation to quadratic regression,
where the general equation is:

yi = C2 x 2 + C1 x + C0

n 2
where: SSR yi (C0 + C1 xi + C2 xi2 )
i=1

The partial derivatives for this quadratic function will be:

(SSR) n
= 2 y (C0 + C1 x + C2 x 2 ) = 0
(C0 ) i=1

(SSR) n
= 2 y (C0 + C1 x + C2 x 2 ) x = 0
(C1 ) i=1

(SSR) n
= 2 y (C0 + C1 x + C2 x 2 ) x 2 = 0
(C2 ) i=1

Dividing both sides by 2 and factoring out the constants, this leads us to the following
equations:

n n n
C0 n + C1 xi + C2 x = yi 2
i equation (a)
i=1 i=1 i=1
n n n n
C0 xi + C1 xi2 + C2 xi3 = xi yi equation (b)
i=1 i=1 i=1 i=1
n n n n
C0 xi2 + C1 xi3 + C2 xi4 = xi2 yi equation (c)
i=1 i=1 i=1 i=1

which can be expressed as the following:

n n n
n x x i
2
i y i
i=1 i=1 C i=1
n n n 0 n
(1)

x x x i
2
i
3
i
C1 =

xi yi
i=1 i=1 i=1 i=1
n n n C2 n


x x x 2
i
3
i
4
i




xi yi
2

i=1 i=1 i=1 i=1

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The creation of the matrix and its representation of the 3 equations above can be observed
by looking at the multiplication of the matrices on the right hand side of (1). To multiply two
matrices we need to do the dot product of each row of the first matrix and the only column
of the second matrix. This calculates the sum of all the products of matching members as
seen below:

n n
n x x i
2
i
i=1 i=1 C
n n n 0


x x x i
2
i
3
i
C1

i=1 i=1 i=1
n n n C2


x x x 2
i
3
i
4
i


i=1 i=1 i=1

n n
= C0 n + C1 xi + C2 xi2
i=1 i=1
n
= yi
i=1

As seen, finding the dot product of the first row of the first matrix and the second matrix
yields equation (a). Finding the dot product of the next two rows of the first matrix will
result in equation (b) and (c). Therefore, matrices can be used to represent equations (a),
(b) and (c).

We can determine the value of the constants by multiplying both sides of (1) by the
transposed first matrix:

1
n n n
n xi x 2
i yi
C0 i=1 i=1 i=1
n n n n
1 =
C xi xi2 x 3
i
i i
x y
C i=1 i=1 i=1 i=1
2 n n n n


xi2 xi3 x 4
i




i i
x 2
y
i=1 i=1 i=1 i=1

To calculate the inverse matrix of a 3 3 matrix, we can use the following process.
a b c

Suppose a general matrix in the form: M= d e f , where each letter corresponds to a
g h i

real number. The inverse matrix will be:
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e f d f d e

h i g i g h

1 a c a b
M 1 = b c
M h i g i g h

b c a c a b

e f d f d e

a b
where the arbitrary minor matrix: = ad bc
c d
and what is known as the determinant:

e f d f d e
M =a b +c = a(ei fh) b(di fg)+ c(dh eg)
h i g i g h

A curve can then be generated for a quadratic function by solving for the coefficients in the
matrix. In the case of India, we have the information of the proportion of income earned by
each quintile of the population shown in Table 1.

Inputting the xi and yi values depicted in the table into matrix equation 1, we get the
following:

C0 6 1
3 2.29 1.961

C1 = 3 2.29 1.8 1.6152
C 2.29 1.8 1.5664 1.42668
2

To solve for the inverse of matrix, we must first find its determinant which can be
calculated by summing the product of a cofactor of the first row and their respective minor
matrix:

2.29 1.8 3 1.8 3 2.29

6 3 + 2.29
1.8 1.5664 2.29 1.5664 2.29 1.8
= 6(3.59 3.24) 3(4.70 4.12) + 2.29(5.4 5.24)
= 0.60347

The reciprocal of this can be multiplied to the following matrix to give us the transposition
of the matrix:
 11

2.29 1.8

3 1.8 3 2.29
1.8 1.5664 2.29 1.5664 2.29 1.8

1 3 2.29 6 2.29 6 3

0.60347 1.8 1.5664 2.29 1.5664 2.29 1.8

3 2.29 6 2.29 6 3

2.29 1.8 3 1.8 3 2.29

0.347 0.577 0.156

1
= 0.577 4.154 3.93
0.60347
0.156 3.93 4.74

0.490 0.815 0.220

= 0.815 5.869 5.553

0.220 5.553 6.697

We can determine the value of the coefficients, C0 ,C1 ,C2 , by substituting this into the
original equation.
0.815 0.220
C0 0.490
1.961

C1 = 0.815 5.869 5.553 1.6152

C
6.697
1.42668
2 0.220 5.553


0.04139503523151611
C0

C1 = 0.04057415997524583
C
2
1.0179444066877004

This would give us the quadratic equation:

y = C2 x 2 + C1 x + C0
y = 1.02x 2 0.041x 0.041

In the equation above, the coefficients have been represented up to 3 significant figures
for ease of observation. The resultant Lorenz curve (Lq) amidst the scatter points of input
can be seen below:
Cumulative Proportion of Income
12

L0 (x) = x

Lq (x) = 1.02x 2 0.041x 0.041

Cumulative Proportion of Population

Figure 6: The resultant Lorenz curve from quadratic regression

From the nature of the curve, we can tell that it does not pass through the data points
exulted in Table 1. This suggests that the prediction of the y values for all x based on a
limited set of data does not accurately portray the income proportion of each segment of
the population for India. From the deviations of the data points (highlighted by the red
points in Figure 6) from the best fit curve, we can formulate a table to depict each residual
point:

x y y1 e

0 0.00 -0.04 0.04

0.2 0.06 0.01 0.05

0.4 0.15 0.14 0.01

0.6 0.28 0.35 -0.07

0.8 0.47 0.64 -0.17

1.0 1.0 1.102 -0.102

Table 2: Residual Plot Data for Table 1

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The residual sum of squares, as explained earlier is a measure that indicates the degree
to which a statistical model is a good fit for a data set. The value of SSR in this case is
SSR = 0.048404 which suggests that the although the quadratic line draws a suitable best fit
line, it does not perfectly represent the data. More significantly, it does not fulfil the
requirements of a Lorenz curve which is that it pass through the origin and point B (1,1) .
This was a limitation I recognised only after the computation of data, and drawing the
curve out using graphing software. I realised that using quadratic regression might not be
an appropriate method to sketch a Lorenz curve.

To combat this issue, I decided to use polynomial regression to define a polynomial of a

higher degree using the data points in Table 1.

Since we have 6 data points, a polynomial equation of the fifth degree can be constructed
to represent the Lorenz curve. I chose to use a fifth degree polynomial here with the
general equation of, yi = C5 x 5 + C4 x 4 + C3 x 3 + C2 x 2 + C1 x + C0 , since this is the maximum
order of a polynomial that can be created using 6 data points, presumably result in the
most accurate Lorenz curve possible. The aforementioned equation (1) can be
alternatively written as:

1 x1 x12 y
C0 1
1 x2 x22 y2
C1 =
! ! !
C !
xn2 yn
2
1 xn

where n refers to the number of x and y coordinates. The first matrix in the equation above
is known as a Vandermonde matrix which is a type of matrix that arises in the polynomial
least squares fitting (Weisstein). In the case of a polynomial of the fifth degree, using the
values from Table 1 this is represented as:
C0
1 0 0 0 0 0 0
C1
1 0.2 0.04 0.008 0.0016 0.00032 0.061
1 0.4 0.16 0.064 0.0256 0.01024 C2 0.153
=
1 0.6 0.36 0.216 0.1296 0.0776 C3 0.279

1 0.8 0.64 0.512 0.4096 0.32768 C4 0.468
1 1 1 1 1 1 1
C5

C0
1
1 0 0 0 0 0 0
C1
1 0.2 0.04 0.008 0.0016 0.00032 0.061
C2 1 0.4 0.16 0.064 0.0256 0.01024 0.153
=
C3 1 0.6 0.36 0.216 0.1296 0.0776 0.279

C4 1 0.8 0.64 0.512 0.4096 0.32768 0.468
1 1 1 1 1 1 1
C5

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Performing the aforementioned steps on inversion and matrix multiplication using I.T. (a
calculator), due to the magnitude of the matrix we get the following matrix for the
constants:
C
0 0
C1
0.363692946057596
C2 1.30244640387085
=
C 3 6.54629149376606
C 10.1476054633385
4 5.54006742737785
C5

From these values, the equation for the Lorenz curve of India in 2013 will be:

5.540x 5 10.148x 4 + 6.546x 3 1.302x 2 + 0.364x

seen as the Lorenz curve in the diagram below, with the various scatter points defining
Indias income quintiles from Table 1.
Cumulative Proportion of Income

Lq (x) = 1.02x 2 0.041x 0.041

L0 (x) = x

L(x) = 5.540x 5 10.148x 4 + 6.546x 3 1.302x 2 + 0.364 x

Cumulative Proportion of Population

Figure 7: The resultant Lorenz curve from polynomial regression

 15

In comparison to the Lorenz curve derived from quadratic regression, it is observed that
using a polynomial of the 5th degree is more suitable to calculate the Lorenz curve, since it
goes through both the origin and point B.

The gini coefficient using the integral formula according to our curve and data is:

1
G = 2 x (5.540x 5 10.148x 4 + 6.546x 3 1.302x 2 + 0.364x)dx
0

= 0.443

As can be seen, this Lorenz curve has no deviation from the data points as it interests all 6
of them seen in Table 1. Since there are no residual points, this suggests that it is a more
accurate depiction of Indias income distribution that Lq obtained with polynomial
regression.

According to official data, the Gini coefficient of India in 2013 was G=0.510, which is not
equivalent to the Gini coefficient calculated from the predicted Lorenz Curve, L . This
might be a result of limited range of data used which reduces the socio-political viability of
the calculations and does not accurately estimate the Gini Coefficient. In this case,
polynomial regression to sketch a Lorenz curve would be more accurate with a larger set
of data.

Method 3: Using the Covariance formula

The calculation of the Gini Coefficient using geometrical interpretations based on the
Lorenz Curve, is only one of the myriad ways the index can be calculated with. An
alternative method is to represent the Gini Index in terms of the covariance between
income levels (proportion of population) and the cumulative distribution of income.
Knowing the general formula of the Gini Coefficient using the Lorenz curve, we can rewrite
it as:

1
G = 2 L0(x) L(x)dx
0
1
= 1 2 L(x)dx
0

In this case, lets assume that the cumulative distribution function F(x) gives the proportion
of the population having an income level below or equal to x . This is a non-decreasing
function that represents the percentage of individuals with an income below x . Lets call
this proportion p . Additionally, lets assume that F(x) is continuously differentiable such that
the following density exists:

F (x) = f (x)

where for a given value of x the proportion p can be alternatively defined as:
x

p = f (x) = F(x)
0
 16

Using the geometrical representation of the aforementioned general formula for the Gini
Coefficient, we can represent it in terms of the covariance between income levels and the
cumulative distribution of income (Lubrano).

G = 1 2 L( p)dx
0

where Cov is the covariance = 2 Cov(x, F(x)) between income levels y and the

cumulative distribution of
the same income F(y) and is average income.

The table below represents household incomes for each of Indias quintiles, as an
extension of Table 1:

Proportion of Proportion of Income Household Income

Population: (converting % to (Rs/Annum)
(converting % to decimals yi
decimals)
xi
1 0.2 (first quintile) 0.061 19,041
2 0.4 (second quintile) 0.153 29,353

3 0.6 (third quintile) 0.279 41,220

4 0.8 (fourth quintile) 0.468 65,235

5 1 (fifth quintile) 1.0 153,872

Table 3: Table of mean income levels corresponding to each population
quintile in India

Using this, the cumulative distribution of income refers to x coordinates while income levels
refer to the average personal income corresponding to x segment of the population. This
suggests that the Gini coefficient is proportional to the covariance between a variable and
its rank. The covariance of two variables indicates how they change together. As such, it
provides a measure of the degree of correlation between sets of random variables, with a
positive covariance value suggesting a positively relation and a negative value, an inverse
relation.

Understanding the idea of covariance was especially challenging for me, since statistics
was one topic that was not visited in any of my math lessons. As such, as opposed to a
formulaic one, I attempted to diagrammatically understanding and explain the concept.
Using the paired data in Table 3, a scatter plot is seen below:
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Figure 8: Diagrammatical representation of Covariance

In the diagram I drew all possible rectangles that could exist between the 5 data points,
colouring them red. Here, the covariance is represented net amount of red in the plot
(reflecting the average covariation between the variables), which would be roughly around
the middle due to darker shades of red there. Mathematically, this is shown with the
formula:
n

(x x )(y y )
i i
Cov(x, y) = i=1
n 1
x = independent variable
where: y = dependent variable
n = number of data points
x = mean of independent variable, x
y = mean of dependent variable, y

Using the values in Table 3, we can calculate x and y first.

5

x i
3
x= i=1
= = 0.6
5 5 5
y i
308, 721
y= i=1
= = 61, 744.2 =
5 5

Substituting these values into the aforementioned covariance formula we get:

5

(x x )(y y )
i i
Cov(x, y) = i=1
4
17081.28 + 6478.24 + 0 + 698.16 + 36851.12
=
4
= 15277.2
 18

2
Dividing this value by we can calculate the value of the Gini Coefficient using the

covariance formula:
2
G= 15277.2
61744.2
= 0.495
As can be seen, the value of G=0.495 is not equivalent to the officially stated value for the
Gini Coefficient of India in 2013 of G=0.510, calculated and published by the Indian
government using their complete data. With only 5 generalised income levels used to
determine the covariance between income levels and proportions of population in India,
this is inevitable. By using a limited number of data points, I realised I am ignoring various
idiosyncrasies that may be present in the income distribution of each individual segment.
This has led to an underestimation of the Gini coefficient of India.

As with the result from the first method, the reason for the discrepancy most likely lies
primary in the limited access a civilian has to national income data. This creates
challenges in observing the effectiveness of distinct methods to calculate the Gini
Coefficient.

Discussion and Analysis

In this investigation, I attempted to present an analysis of three formulaic methods to
calculate the Gini Coefficient; two based on area ratios under a Lorenz curve and the other
based on covariance formulas.

The numerical integration method of the Trapezium rule in comparison to Method 2 is

extremely unreliable as it inevitably results in a positive bias for the Lorenz curve, and a
negative bias for the gini coefficient. This is because, the method creates the curve with
straight line segments that would lie above parabolic lines connecting the data points (as
seen in Method 2). This results in a greater area underneath the Lorenz curve for Method
1, and thus a smaller Gini coefficient.

When comparing methods 2 and 3, despite the fact that the values of the Gini coefficient
using Methods 2 and 3 were lower than the governmentally defined value of G=0.510,
Method 2 seems to be more ineffective in accurately measuring the value since the value it
predicted had a greater discrepancy from the actual value, than the one predicted by the
covariance formula. A reason for this could be that formulating the Lorenz curve L(x) from a
data set of size n = 6 results in a curve that estimates income proportions (y) for all the
unspecified segments / population proportions of the Indian society (x) . In the case of my
investigation, where the data points were restricted to quintile income data this gives great
room for uncertainties and inaccurate estimations of the income disparity within these
quintiles. On the other hand, since the Gini coefficient based on the covariance formula
 19

was solely derived from the relationship between the 5 x and y coordinates, its value of
G=0.495 was closer to the actual value.

With empirical evidence form my investigation, the Gini coefficient seems to be most
accurately calculated using the covariance-based method. However, with better access to
a wide range of income proportions and data points, most governments opt to employ the
Lorenz curve to determine the coefficient instead (Method 2). The most distinct difference
between Method 2 and Method 3 is that the Lorenz curve is an extremely contextualised
and direct manner to calculate the Gini. This is because, it was created primarily to act as
a graph of the cumulative frequencies of income proportions and population proportions,
which along with the well defined rules for the curve suggest that it was solely meant for
this purpose. On the other hand, the covariance formula in Method 3, is used as an
inference to the Gini Coefficient, generally indicating the type of relationships between two
random variables. This allows Method 3, to provide measurements for various other areas
of interest such as the magnitude of positive or negative correlation between any two
variables. This trait of Method 3, can be used to better understand the degree of inequality
in a country, by filling in loopholes that may exist as a result of the coefficient being a
simplistic consideration of income distribution.

Overall, the Gini coefficient does have limitations as a measure of inequality. One of the
major ones is that the coefficient is not additive across various segments of a population
and fails to ignore the nuances of income disparity that may exist within each segment. For
a better judgement of a nations inequality degree, the coefficient is used in conjunction
with other indices of income inequality such as the Theil Index, which is additive over
various population segments and measures. It identifies the share of inequality attributable
to the between region components, and is measurement based on General Entropy
formulae, mitigating some of the limitations of the Gini coefficient. /cite/

Assumptions and Limitations

In the investigation, the use of the Gini coefficient as a tool to compare income inequalities
of multiple countries was not explored. This could have been a possible extension of the
investigation, which could also lend for a deeper understanding of its relevance in modern
economic inequality and its reliability as such.

Additionally, the scope of the research, as a result of limited access to census data
regarding Indias income proportions, was limited. Yet, for the sake of comparison and
exploration, the results were assumed to be conclusive and were compared to the actual
value of the coefficient published by the Indian government to determine the reliability of
each method.
 20

Conclusion
The investigation enabled us to determine the various implications and calculations of the
Gini coefficients that may vary numerically depending on the nuances of each method.
Working with the Gini coefficient and with so many areas of mathematics that were novel
to me has allowed me appreciate the idea of inequality, the sharing of monetary resources
and applied mathematics in the modern day. I was astonished at how drastic the difference
was between the lowest and highest quintiles of Indias earning population, an insight
which would have not been as revelatory without mathematically deriving them through
Lorenz curves. quantitative and empirical analysis of social issues such as income
inequality allowed me to broaden my perspective on the implications and severity of this
prevalent issue.
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