Tuloerot ja taloudellisen tuloksen vaihtelu kirjanpitotiloilla poikkileikkaus- ja aikasarja-analyysin valossa vuosina 1976—83

Yearly variations in the economic results and income differences among the Finnish family farms were analyzed in this study. The main purpose was to find out the income and profitability distribution of the farms and trends of them during the last decade. In addition, the stability of the economic results of the farms in the different years of the research period was analyzed. Analyses were based on statistics of the Finnish book-keeping farms in the years 1976—83. To eliminate the problems caused by the changes in the sample of book-keeping farms, the final analyses were based on a subsample of those farms, where the data was available for all the years. The total number of these farms was 617. Farm family income and the coefficient of profitability were the economic concepts analyzed in the study. The latter one expresses the imputed wage of farm family and the interest claim for total capital as a share of net income. Distribution of farm family income and profitability and the shape and location of the distribution in each year was analyzed by several statistical measures. The shape of income and profitability distributions was quite skewed which is typical for farm income distributions in all countries. Income differences and changes of income distribution during the research period were analyzed in more detail by using fractiles, quartiles and deciles. Also Lorenz-curves were calculated from the data. The main conclusion drawn from the analyses was, that the relative income differences have not increased during the research period. On the other hand, it is worth while to point out that absolute income differences have nevertheless increased. Analyses concerning the stability of the economic results of an individual farm over the research period indicate quite big variation between the years. Only a half of the farms of the lowest quartile remain in this category in all the years