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The wealth-to-salary ratio: a simple indicator of inequality

Jhordan Silveira de Borba, Sebastián Gonçalves, Celia Anteneodo · 2026 · arXiv (Cornell University)

DOI: 10.48550/arxiv.2610.24192 · cited by 0 works (OpenAlex) · open-access PDF

German

In früheren Studien haben wir mithilfe von Agent-basierten Simulationen eines von Ian Wright vorgeschlagenen Modells einer kapitalistischen Wirtschaft gezeigt, dass die Ungleichheit sowohl bei der Vermögens- als auch bei der Einkommensverteilung weitgehend von einem einzigen Schlüsselparameter geregelt wird: dem Verhältnis zwischen dem durchschnittlichen Vermögen pro Kopf und dem durchschnittlichen Lohn, bezeichnet durch $R$. Dieser Parameter erfasst die relative Bedeutung der angesammelten Vermögenswerte im Vergleich zum Arbeitseinkommen. Im Modell sind größere Werte von $R$ systematisch mit höheren Ungleichheitswerten assoziiert, wie sie durch den Gini-Koeffizient gemessen werden. In der aktuellen Arbeit untersuchen wir, ob diese Beziehung auch in realen Volkswirtschaften

Machine translation (Meta M2M100); the English original follows.

Abstract

In previous studies, using agent-based simulations of a model of a capitalist economy proposed by Ian Wright, we showed that inequality in both wealth and income distributions is largely governed by a single key parameter: the ratio between average wealth per capita and the mean salary, denoted by $R$. This parameter captures the relative importance of accumulated assets compared with labor income. In the model, larger values of $R$ are systematically associated with higher levels of inequality, as measured by the Gini coefficient. In the present work, we investigate whether this relationship is also observed in real-world economies. Using empirical data from the World Inequality Database (WID) and the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), we construct empirical estimates of $R$ and compare them with standard measures of income and wealth inequality. We find a positive relation between $R$ and inequality across several empirical settings, with the strongest relationships observed for mature and advanced economies. These results provide empirical support for the role of the wealth-to-salary ratio as a simple macroscopic indicator associated with economic inequality, while also highlighting the limitations imposed by differences in data definitions and measurement across countries and periods.

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Topics: Inequality, Econometrics, Gini coefficient, Economics, Economic inequality, Income inequality metrics

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