An economic approach to achievement and improvement indexes

Abstract

This study proposes a useful alternative to the "aggregate deprivation index" which is used to measure the well-beings of individuals in different countries or geographic locations. Furthermore, we also propose an improvement index which alleviates well known difficulties associated with overtime comparisons of "aggregate deprivation index". While deriving our indexes, we pursued an economic approach to index numbers theory and relied on the assumptions of optimizing behavior. The proposed achievement index has its roots in the theory of quantity indexes whose axiomatic properties are well established. The roots of our improvement index on the other hand, is well grounded in the productivity growth literature. The study also provides a numerical example.