Balk B.M. Price and Quantity Index Numbers: Models for Measuring Aggregate Change and Difference

Cambridge University Press, 2008. — 300 p. — ISBN: 0521889073, 9780521889070Price and quantity indices are important, much-used measuring instruments, and it is therefore necessary to have a good understanding of their properties. This book is the first comprehensive text on index number theory since Irving Fisher’s 1922 The Making of Index Numbers. The book covers intertemporal and interspatial comparisons; ratio- and difference-type measures; discrete and continuous time environments; and upper- and lower-level indices. Guided by economic insights, this book develops the instrumental or axiomatic approach. There is no role for behavioural assumptions. In addition to subject matter chapters, two entire chapters are devoted to the rich history of the subject.Price indices through history
The quest for international comparisons
Axioms, tests, and indices
Decompositions and subperiods
Price indices for elementary aggregates
Divisia and Montgomery indices
International comparisons: transitivity and additivity.