Schema: Entities and Values

This site was created because I was not able to find many examples of Monetary Amounts or Quantitative Values.

Entities vs. Values

Let’s discuss, is a monetary amount an entity? Or is a monetary amount a value?

If the monetary amount is an entity it ought to have an ID and a clause "sameAs" to make it easier for data to connect across the Internet, such as using structured data in search engines.

What is an Entity?

An entity exists as itself, it is distinct from other entities. An entity can belong to a class. Yet, entities of the same class are distinct from each other.

For example, an entity can be a real person or an organization. The class of the entity with the name "Jane Doe" is a person. There may be even two entities with the same name , "Jane Doe", which are distinct. One Jane was born 1977 in Austin, Texas, USA, the other Jane was born 2002, in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

Entities can be a concept. Furthermore, entities can be  fictional characters and organizations They do not need to materially exist.

Very common entity classes we describe the world with are Person, Organization, Locations, and Events.

What are Entity Attributes and Relations?

An Entity is described by its attributes. For example a person is described by name, birthdate, place of birth, hair color, eye color, etc.

Some attributes help us to distinguish two entities of the same class. This might be a set of attributes.

An attribute has a name, the attribute name and a value, the attribute value. When we have an attribute value that is another entity, we call this a relationship between entities. In our example we have the attribute "place-of-birth" with a value of class location. The location is an entity of its own.

What is a Value?

Entities are described by their attributes. Each attribute has one or more values. Some values can be of a specific type, such as the value of a place-of-birth must be an entity of class location.

Some attribute values are complex things but they are not an entity. For example a monetary amount describes a thing that has at least three attributes: a name, a currency and an amount.

Why is a Monetary Amount Not an Entity?

A monetary amount describes the concept of a certain amount of currency. It depends on the context what this means. For example the amount of money exchanged as payment for goods and services may be nominally the same as an amount on a bank account. Yet these amounts are not the same in the sense that the monetary amount could have an ID.

Even if the two monetary amounts share all the attributes, they are not the same in the sense that you want to link all monetary amounts of $1,000 together.

Schema Examples for Values

This website provides schema generators for some schema types. The generators produce JSON+LD format in the vocabulary of schema.org.

The output is a schema rich with alternate names that can be copied into one’s own context.

  1. Monetary Amounts

    Monetary amounts are values that express quantities of a currency. For example, $100  is a monetary amount. The same amount can be expressed as "one hundred dollars" or "100 USD"

  2. Quantitative Values

    1. Monetary Amounts per Time Unit

      Monetary amounts per time unit express a monetary amount periodically repeated.

      1. Monetary Amount per Year

        A common case for annual amounts of money is a salary. For example a "$100,000 a year salary" is a monetary amount ($100,000) per time unit (a year). The same amount can be expressed as "one hundred thousand dollars per year" or "a salary of 100,000 USD" (salary implies a annual amount)

      2. Monetary Amount per Month

        Many salaried employees receive their salary in monthly installments. For example a "monthly paycheck of 6,000 US dollars" is a monetary amount (6,000 US dollar) per time unit (a month). The same amount can be expressed as "six thousand dollars per month" or "a monthly salary of 6,000 USD"

      3. Monetary Amount Every Other Week

        Many wage earners get a paycheck every other week. This is called a bi-weekly schedule in the payroll industry. For example a "paycheck of $2,400 every other week" is a monetary amount (2,400 US dollar) per time unit (every two weeks). The same amount can be expressed as "2400 dollars a fortnight" or "a bi-weekly paycheck of 2,400 USD"

      4. Monetary Amount per Month

        In some industries, people are paid an hourly wage and they receive a paycheck at the end of a workweek. For example a "weekly paycheck of 1400 dollars" is a monetary amount (1400 US dollars) per time unit (a week). The same amount can be expressed as "fourteen hundred dollars per week" or "a weekly paycheck of $1,400"