Pareto Analysis is a statistical technique in decision-
making used for the selection of a limited number of
tasks that produce significant overall effect. It uses the
Pareto Principle (also known as the 80/20 rule) the idea
that by doing 20% of the work you can generate 80% of
the benefit of doing the entire job. Take quality
improvement, for example, a vast majority of problems
(80%) are produced by a few key causes (20%). This
technique is also called the vital few and the trivial many.
In the late 1940s Romanian-born American engineer and
management consultant, Joseph M. Juran suggested the
principle and named it after Italian economist Vilfredo
Pareto, who observed that 80% of income in Italy went
to 20% of the population. Pareto later carried out surveys
in some other countries and found to his surprise that a
similar distribution applied.