Two Meanings of "Index"/"Indexing" Not in OED

[victor steinbok]

I find the related index 9.e. problematic:

 e. Econ. A number showing the variation (increase or decrease) in the
> prices or value of some specified set of goods, shares, etc., since a chosen
> ‘base’ period (often represented by the number 100), as a retail price
> index, a cost-of-living index, etc. Cf. Dow-Jones n.



Aside from listing actual indexes, the definition is more appropriate to
"market indicators", in general, except for second part of the definition
which identifies a scaled quantity. None of the mentions "indexes" are
represented relative to 100. These numbers are usually absolute, but the
relative changes are converted to percents, which are based on 100. But
these changes are not the index!!

Similarly, a compound measure taken from representative subclasses serves as
an "index" in other venues--they need not be economic. For example, a
compound measure in psychometrics may well be an index--a single score that
may be computed from a number of subscores. Similarly, in various ranking
systems (e.g., college, car, city quality), the representative numbers are
also indexes, computed similar with a help of a compound formula. This could
be something very simple--as is the case of stock indexes, such as
Dow-Jones, or fairly complicated weighted score, as is the case with US News
college and law school ranking. But "index" is appropriate for the score in
each case, even if the object in some cases is ranking in the order of
decreasing (or increasing) index.

In addition, following the meaning Fred points out, "indexed" could be
adjectival (by OED standards), as in "indexed fund", which appears on par
with "index fund". For example, there are investment funds that are indexed
to S&P500. Others are indexed to Dow Jones. Different companies refer to
these products differently (but all involve the word "index" in some form).

Indexed is listed as an adjective separately (as opposed to derivative), but
it does not include this meaning.

VS-)

On Mon, Jul 18, 2011 at 3:37 PM, Shapiro, Fred <fred.shapiro at yale.edu>wrote:

>
> Two meanings of "index" (verb) and "indexing" that are not in OED are the
> following:
>
> Adjusting wages, benefits, etc. to compensate for inflation.
>
> Investing funds to mirror an index of securities.
>
> Fred Shapiro

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