On the Interpretation of the Disposable Household Income Statistical Indicator

Abstract

Currently, several similar but not identical statistical indicators characterizing the income of the population/households in Russia are published and all of these indicators are more or less official. Namely these are the following indicators: (a) an indicator of the real disposable monetary income of the population, published in all major statistical datasets, usually in the form of corresponding indices and officially used by government agencies;(b) an indicator of gross disposable income of households published in the official statistical yearbook «National accounts of Russia» as an absolute value at current prices; (c) an indicator of real disposable household income published in form of index in the statistical yearbook of the international organization (OECD) based on data for Russia received from Rosstat. The difference between them is that one of them focuses only on monetary incomes, while the other two use the classical interpretation of disposable income used in the system of national accounts, which also includes incomes in kind. There are also differences in approaches to deflation. But, objectively, the simultaneous use of all of these indicators is not so much due to the difference in their content or methodology, but rather to the peculiarities of the organization of the statistical system and the incomplete implementation of the system of national accounts in Russia. However, the simultaneous use of several indicators that are similar in terms of content leads to some confusion among users who do not have special statistical qualifications. The article examines the methodological differences between the indicators listed above, which lead to differences in their size and semantic content, as well as differences in the formats of their publication, and also provides recommendations for their correct use and interpretation.