ABSTRACT
This paper starts with a brief statement of the assumption that income distribution improves as income per head rises and that one way in which this is achieved is the ‘trickle-down’ of expenditures (and therefore incomes) to the lowest income groups. Some conditions are defined for this assumption and subjected to some theoretical criticism. More particularly, a plea is entered for a more attentive hearing of the structuralist case that social and political forces need to be taken into account in any description or analysis of income distribution. Still couched in very general terms, a brief review of some development strategies show that typically two popular strategies are likely to be attended by increases in the inequality of income distribution. The second part of the paper looks at some of the problems of definition of indicators and measurements of income distribution with regard to the familiar constraints of lack of data availability and the need to take account of the structuralist demand mentioned above. Rejecting as inadequate a regional approach, the paper ends by proposing a somewhat unusual form of tabulation and applies this technique to Zambian data for 1970.
