Computational tools for poverty measurement and analysis

This paper introduces some relatively straightforward computational tools for estimating poverty measures from the sort of data that are typically available from published sources. All that is required for using these tools is an elementary regression package. The methodology also easily lends itself to a number of poverty simulations, some of which are discussed. The paper addresses the central question: How do we construct poverty measures from grouped data on consumption and income? Two broad approaches can be identified: simple interpolation methods and methods based on parameterized Lorenz curves. The paper briefly describes the two approaches and discusses why the second may be considered preferable.Income. ,Consumption (Economic theory) ,Poverty Research Methodology. ,

Poverty in India and Indian states

A complete and updated series on poverty measures for India is presented spanning the period 1951–1994. The series are presented at the all-India level as well as for 15 major states, and for rural and urban sectors separately. Key features of the evolution of poverty in India are described.Poverty India ,

Determinants of Poverty in Egypt

Poverty alleviation Egypt ,Development policies ,Food prices Government policy Egypt ,Agricultural wages ,

Macroeconomic crises and poverty monitoring : a case study for India

This case study for India finds an explanation for the drop in average household consumption in rural areas occurring in the year after the 1991 stabilization program instigated to deal with a macroeconomic crisis. A number of factors contributed to falling average living standards, including inflation, a drop in agricultural yields, and contraction in the non-farm sector. The same factors resulted in high poverty measures, although there was also a sizable unexplained shift in distribution. Despite their having an unusually rich data base, the authors nevertheless are unable to account for a large share of the increase in measured poverty, and cannot rule out the possibility that it was the result of sampling and non-sampling errors. Only about one-tenth of the measured increase in poverty is explicable in terms of the variables that would be expected to transmit shocks to the household level. Soon after, the poverty measures returned to their previous level. The study cautions users of survey-based welfare indicators not to read too much into a single survey, particularly when (as here) its results are difficult to explain in terms of other data on hand. However, the usefulness of objective socioeconomic survey data for longer-term poverty monitoring should not be thrown into doubt by these results.Poverty Monitoring&Analysis,Environmental Economics&Policies,Poverty Reduction Strategies,Services&Transfers to Poor,Health Economics&Finance,Poverty Assessment,Services&Transfers to Poor,Safety Nets and Transfers,Rural Poverty Reduction,Environmental Economics&Policies

El Nino or El Peso? Crisis, poverty, and income distribution in the Philippines

Using household survey data for 1998, the authors assess the distributional impact of the recent economic crisis in the Philippines. The results suggest that the impact of the crisis was modest, leading to a five percent reduction in average living standards, and a nine percent increase in the incidence of poverty - with larger increases indicated for the depth, and severity of poverty. The greater shock came from El Nino, rather than through the labor market. The labor market shock was progressive (reducing inequality) while El Nino shock was regressive (increasing inequality). Not all households were equally vulnerable to the crisis-induced shocks. Household and community characteristics affected the impact of the shocks. Ownership of land, made households more susceptible to the El Nino shocks, higher levels of education made households more vulnerable to wage, and employment shocks. The impact of the crisis was greater in more commercially developed communities. Occupational diversity within a household helped mitigate the adverse impact. There is some evidence of consumption smoothing by the households affected by the crisis, but the poor were less able to protect their consumption, which is a matter of policy concern.Environmental Economics&Policies,Inequality,Poverty Assessment,Economic Theory&Research,Health Economics&Finance

Has India's economic growth become more pro-poor in the wake of economic reforms ?

The extent to which India's poor have benefited from the country’s economic growth has long been debated. This paper revisits the issues using a new series of consumption-based poverty measures spanning 50 years, and including a 15-year period after economic reforms began in earnest in the early 1990s. Growth has tended to reduce poverty, including in the post-reform period. There is no robust evidence that the responsiveness of poverty to growth has increased, or decreased, since the reforms began, although there are signs of rising inequality. The impact of growth is higher for poverty measures that reflect distribution below the poverty line, and it is higher using growth rates calculated from household surveys than national accounts. The urban-rural pattern of growth matters to the pace of poverty reduction. However, in marked contrast to the pre-reform period, the post-reform process of urban economic growth has brought significant gains to the rural poor as well as the urban poor.Rural Poverty Reduction,Achieving Shared Growth,Services&Transfers to Poor,Inequality

Is India's economic growth leaving the poor behind?

There has been much debate about how much India's poor have shared in the economic growth unleashed by economic reforms in the 1990s. The authors argue that India has probably maintained its 1980s rate of poverty reduction in the 1990s. However, there is considerable diversity in performance across states. This holds some important clues for understanding why economic growth has not done more for India's poor. India's economic growth in the 1990s has not been occurring in the states where it would have the most impact on poverty nationally. If not for the sectoral and geographic imbalance of growth, the national rate of growth would have generated a rate of poverty reduction that was double India's historical trend rate. States with relatively low levels of initial rural development and human capital development were not well-suited to reduce poverty in response to economic growth. The study's resultsare consistent with the view that achieving higher aggregate economic growth is only one element of an effective strategy for poverty reduction in India. The sectoral and geographic composition of growth is also important, as is the need to redress existing inequalities in human resource development and between rural and urban areas.Economic Conditions and Volatility,Public Health Promotion,Health Monitoring&Evaluation,Environmental Economics&Policies,Services&Transfers to Poor,Achieving Shared Growth,Poverty Assessment,Environmental Economics&Policies,Governance Indicators,Economic Conditions and Volatility

How important to India's poor is the urban - rural composition of growth?

Views differ on how much India's poor have shared in the growth and contraction in the country's average standard of living since independence. Some have argued that the rural growth that accompanied the green revolution in the 1970s and 1980s brought few gains to the poor in the rural sector, while others have viewed agricultural growth as the key to rural poverty reduction. Views have also differed on how much urban growth has benefited the poor. The authors used 33 household surveys spanning 1951-1991 to examine the relative importance to India's poor of both urban and rural consumption growth. Among other things, they tested for spillover effects between sectors: does urban growth have the same effects on the rural distribution of consumption as rural growth has on urban distribution? Urban growth reduced poverty, but adverse distribution effects within the urban sector reduced the gains to the urban poor, and urban growth had no significant effect on rural distribution. Rural growth was distribution-neutral within the rural sector and so brought sizable absolute gains to the rural poor. Rural growth also had pro-poor distributional effects on urban poverty. Identifying the nature of these intra- and inter-sectoral effects reinforces the importance of rural growth to national poverty reduction. Future progress in fighting poverty in India will depend on both the rate of rural economic growth and the country's success in switching to a more pro-poor process of growth.Achieving Shared Growth,Poverty Assessment,Rural Poverty Reduction,Services&Transfers to Poor,Safety Nets and Transfers

Farm productivity and rural poverty in India

To what extent do India's rural poor share in agricultural growth? Combining data from 24 household sample surveys spanning 35 years with other sources, we estimate a model of the joint determination of consumption-poverty measures, agricultural wages, and food prices. We find that higher farm productivity brought both absolute and relative gains to poor rural households. A large share of the gains were via wages and prices, though these effects took time. The benefits to the poor were not confined to those near the poverty line.Farm income India. ,Rural poor India. ,Prices. ,Poverty. ,

Why have some Indian states done better than others at reducing rural poverty?

The unevenness of the rise in rural living standards in the various states of India since the 1950s allowed the authors to study the causes of poverty. They modeled the evolution of average consumption and various poverty measures using pooled state-level data for 1957-91. They found that poverty was reduced by higher agricultural yields, above-trend growth in nonfarm output, and lower inflation rates. But these factors only partly explain relative success and failure in reducing poverty. Initial conditions also mattered. States that started the period with better infrastructure and human resources - with more intense irrigation, greater literacy, and lower infant mortality rates - had significantly greater long-term rates of consumption growth and poverty reduction. By and large, the same variables that promoted growth in average consumption also helped reduce poverty. The effects on poverty measures were partly redistributive in nature. After controlling for inflation, the authors found that some of the factors that helped reduce absolute poverty also improved distribution, and none of the factors that reduced absolute poverty had adverse impacts on distribution. In other words, there was no sign of tradeoffs between growth and pro-poor distribution.Services&Transfers to Poor,Environmental Economics&Policies,Public Health Promotion,Health Economics&Finance,Health Monitoring&Evaluation,Poverty Assessment,Achieving Shared Growth,Environmental Economics&Policies,Inequality,Services&Transfers to Poor