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0 pointsChrisLomont3y ago0 comments

That's why I cited median values - so your complaint does not apply, since by mathematical fact a tiny minority cannot change the median appreciably.

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coliveira3y ago· 1 in thread

People don't seem to understand that median is not a measure that is much better than mean, especially in the case of high inequality. For example, if I take all the money from the 40% poorer population and distribute it to the 40% richer population, the median is still the same. If you don't believe, just compute the mean and median of these two sequences:

[1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10]

[0,0,0,0,5,6,11,11,11,11]

Another example that I know fully well is Brazil: the mean is 8,560 BRL and the median is 8,220 BRL for monthly salaries, that is, very close. But these monthly salaries are known to vary widely from 2,170 BRL (USD 417) to 38,200 BRL (USD 7349), so hardly anyone is really making 8220 or close to that.

ChrisLomontOP3y ago

>People don't seem to understand that median is not a measure that is much better than mean, especially in the case of high inequality.

Yes, they do. I am a PhD mathematician with decades of work using these tools. I am quite clear on the meanings and shortcoming of all sorts of indicators. I am also aware how real world data trends instead of cooked up examples that don't match reality.

Median is a common value used by economists precisely because it more likely shows what a person makes as opposed to the mean, especially in cases of high inequality.

> If you don't believe

Yes, you can make up all sorts of nonsense. Not a single country follows the distributions you made up.

>Another example that I know fully well is Brazil:

You conclusion does not at all follow from your claim. Or from the actual data.

> so hardly anyone is really making [the median] or close to that

Well, by definition, over half of people make the median or more. Is that hardly anyone?

If you look at the data [1] (income by decile in Brazil), besides the 50% making median income or higher, another 30% of the people make within 30% of median. That leaves 20% of the people making under 70% of the median income.

What is your definition of "hardly anyone"?

Look at the data. Clearly median is much more accurate than mean for explaining how much people make, as this example showed.

[1] https://www.statista.com/statistics/1251075/average-monthly-...

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