A power law tail in India's wealth distribution: Evidence from survey data

This study uses survey data from India to examine the top percentile of the wealth distribution in India. Using nationally representative samples from two years, 1991 and 2002, a power law tail is found with a Pareto exponent ranging between 1.8 and 2.4. The tail is examined for three specific groupings: households in the rural areas, households in the urban areas and all households. The distribution of top households also appear to be regionally concentrated with states having the highest number of households in the top 1% in 1991 also generally having the highest number in 2002 as well. (c) 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.