etc.), concessional consumer good, and employers contributions to provident fund; self-employment income (including value of home produce such as agricultural products and livestock consumed within the household) as given by net income after deduction of expenses; non-earnings income such as rent from agricultural land, royalties, interest income and dividend income, imputed rent of owner occupied house; rents from property, etc; and transfer incomes such as remittances, alimony, scholarships, pensions, payment from trust funds and gifts in cash and in kind. It is thus obvious that the DOS has included information on every conceivable source of income. The income information is available at both the household and individual member level.
Several attempts have been made to assess the reliability and comparability of the income data from the HIS, including by making comparison with manufacturing wages from various sources and comparison of national variables (such as personal income and private consumption) derived from the HIS with the estimates for the national accounts. Although much more work on the details of the HIS and their reliability and comparability are still required, but a broad consensus until now is that the available data do provide a good basis for making assessment of income inequality and poverty situations in Malaysia. In fact, according to Bhalla and Kharas (1992), "the overwhelming result from cross-checks of the data is that that these surveys have been extremely well conducted and it is likely that they are amongst the most reliable of the survey conducted in the developing world." It is also generally agreed that the income surveys for the various years are broadly comparable.
While Malaysian income statistics are useful, some of its shortcomings need to be mentioned here. First, the data only contain regular incomes received by the households and excluded the income which does not accrue to households, the most important being the retained earnings of companies which are not distributed. In Malaysia, the amount involved is substantial and if these incomes are distributed it probably will accrue to the high income households and this will make a difference to the measures of overall inequality. The importance of this
