Superstars without talent ? The Yule distribution controversy

Arbeitspapier

Chung and Cox (1994) provided an intuitively appealing stochastic model which indicates that superstars may exist regardless of talent and which gives rise to the Yule distribution. We adopt a different empirical approach and test its goodness-of-fit using a parametric bootstrap and several powerful test statistics. Just like the discrete Pareto distribution, it is overwhelmingly rejected: it is a fairly accurate approximation of the lower quantiles of the superstar distribution, but overestimates the snowball effect that makes consumers purchase records of the most successful artists. In other words, the Yule distribution captures stardom, but not superstardom. A generalization of the Yule distribution provides an excellent fit in two of the three data sets.

Object Details

• Language: Englisch

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: Series: SSE/EFI Working Paper Series in Economics and Finance ; No. 658

Classification and Topics

• Classification: Wirtschaft ; Wage Level and Structure; Wage Differentials ; Entertainment; Media ; Cultural Economics: Economics of the Arts and Literature
• Subject: Superstardom ; Yule distribution ; Künstlerische Berufe ; Statistische Verteilung ; USA

Contributors, Places and Time

• Event: Geistige Schöpfung
• (who): Spierdijk, Laura ; Voorneveld, Mark
• Event: Veröffentlichung
• (who): Stockholm School of Economics, The Economic Research Institute (EFI)
• (where): Stockholm
• (when): 2007

Further information

• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/56199
• Last update: 10.03.2025, 11:42 AM CET