A simple subgroup decomposable measure of upward and downward income mobility

We propose a subgroup decomposable class of income mobility measures with good axiomatic properties by adapting the concept of “individual income gap between two moments in time” to a framework that is traditionally used in the measurement of poverty and deprivation. This framework is explicit in incorporating the necessary judgements about how to aggregate individual income gaps by making use of the indices with best normative properties within the poverty literature. This strategy allows us to provide intuitive and simple measures of downward (and upward) mobility that consider incidence, intensity and inequality of income gaps and are easy to comprehend and communicate to policy makers. Moreover, these measures are consistent with a simple and intuitive graphical device. As an empirical illustration of the use of this class of measures, we present an analysis of downward income mobility for different age groups in three EU countries using the European Union Survey of Income and Living Conditions (EUSILC) longitudinal data from 2004 up to 2015.Universidad de Málaga. Campus de excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech

Measuring the Effect of Spell Recurrence on Poverty Dynamics

The analysis of poverty dynamics yields important insights about the expected effectiveness of alternative social policies on poverty reduction. This paper analyses the effect of spell recurrence on poverty dynamics taking into account multiple poverty and non-poverty spells. Using longitudinal data for Spain we obtain that the poverty exit and re-entry rates vary not only with personal or household characteristics but also with spell accumulation and with the duration of past spells. Results indicate that the effect of duration dependence is significant and turns out to be different by spell order. Our findings support progress towards incorporating full individual poverty trajectories more explicitly in estimating the likelihood of future poverty.poverty dynamics, multiple spells, recurrence

Modeling the Epidemic Outbreak and Dynamics of COVID-19 in Croatia

The paper deals with a modeling of the ongoing epidemic caused by Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) on the closed territory of the Republic of Croatia. Using the official public information on the number of confirmed infected, recovered and deceased individuals, the modified SEIR compartmental model is developed to describe the underlying dynamics of the epidemic. Fitted modified SEIR model provides the prediction of the disease progression in the near future, considering strict control interventions by means of social distancing and quarantine for infected and at-risk individuals introduced at the beginning of COVID-19 spread on February, 25th by Croatian Ministry of Health. Assuming the accuracy of provided data and satisfactory representativeness of the model used, the basic reproduction number is derived. Obtained results portray potential positive developments and justify the stringent precautionary measures introduced by the Ministry of Health.Comment: 5 pages, 6 figures, to appear in the Proceedings of the SpliTech2020 conferenc

What helps households with children in leaving poverty? Evidence from Spain

In this paper we analyse the distinct effectiveness of demographic, labour market and welfare state transfers events in promoting exits from deprivation for childbearing households in Spain, a Southern European Country with high and persistent child poverty and a familial welfare regime. We undertake a thorough analysis of outflow rates and of the effect of events on them by household types using a detailed descriptive approach and a multivariate analysis to control for household heterogeneity. We find that, contrary to the descriptive results, a multivariate approach to the estimation of the outflow rate shows that the presence of children robustly reduces household’s chances to step out of poverty. In turn, both methodologies show that the effectiveness of labour market events is somewhat lower for childbearing households while their prevalence is particularly high. Also, both the prevalence and the effectiveness of events related to the beginning of state transfers are high for households without children.children, poverty dynamics, outflow rate, Spain, trigger events.

The measurement of gender wage discrimination: The distributional approach revisited

This paper presents the advantages of taking into account the distribution of the individual wage gap when analyzing female wage discrimination. The limitations of previous approaches such as the classic Oaxaca-Blinder and the recent distributive proposals using quantile regressions or counterfactual functions are thoroughly discussed. The new methodology presented here relies on Jenkins' (1994) work and proposes the use of poverty and deprivation literature techniques that are directly applicable to the measurement of discrimination. In an empirical application, we quantify the relevance of the glass ceiling and sticky floor phenomena in the Spanish labor market.children distributive analysis, economics of gender, wage discrimination, glass ceiling, sticky floor.

Measuring poverty accounting for time

In this paper we make a methodological proposal to measure poverty accounting for time by proposing a new index that aims at reconciling the way poverty is measured in a static and a dynamic framework. Our index is able to consider the duration of the poverty spell and the social preference for equality in well-being given that, in contrast with others that have been previously proposed, it is sensitive to the level of inequality between individual complete poverty experiences over time. Moreover, other indices in the literature can be interpreted as special cases of our more general measure.intertemporal poverty, duration, equality, poverty measurement

A new countermeasure against side-channel attacks based on hardware-software co-design

This paper aims at presenting a new countermeasure against Side-Channel Analysis (SCA) attacks, whose implementation is based on a hardware-software co-design. The hardware architecture consists of a microprocessor, which executes the algorithm using a false key, and a coprocessor that performs several operations that are necessary to retrieve the original text that was encrypted with the real key. The coprocessor hardly affects the power consumption of the device, so that any classical attack based on such power consumption would reveal a false key. Additionally, as the operations carried out by the coprocessor are performed in parallel with the microprocessor, the execution time devoted for encrypting a specific text is not affected by the proposed countermeasure. In order to verify the correctness of our proposal, the system was implemented on a Virtex 5 FPGA. Different SCA attacks were performed on several functions of AES algorithm. Experimental results show in all cases that the system is effectively protected by revealing a false encryption key.Peer ReviewedPreprin

Hardware architecture implemented on FPGA for protecting cryptographic keys against side-channel attacks

This paper presents a new hardware architecture designed for protecting the key of cryptographic algorithms against attacks by side-channel analysis (SCA). Unlike previous approaches already published, the fortress of the proposed architecture is based on revealing a false key. Such a false key is obtained when the leakage information, related to either the power consumption or the electromagnetic radiation (EM) emitted by the hardware device, is analysed by means of a classical statistical method. In fact, the trace of power consumption (or the EM) does not reveal any significant sign of protection in its behaviour or shape. Experimental results were obtained by using a Virtex 5 FPGA, on which a 128-bit version of the standard AES encryption algorithm was implemented. The architecture could easily be extrapolated to an ASIC device based on standard cell libraries. The system is capable of concealing the real key when various attacks are performed on the AES algorithm, using two statistical methods which are based on correlation, the Welch’s t-test and the difference of means.Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft

Poverty and the business cycle: The role of the intra-household distribution of unemployment

Conventional wisdom predicts that changes in the aggregate unemployment rate may significantly affect a country’s income distribution and, as a consequence, have a relevant impact on the evolution of the poverty rate. However, the relationship between labour macroeconomic indicators and poverty seems to have become weaker in recent times. Using panel data on unemployment and poverty for Spanish regions we estimate a System GMM model in order to model this relationship taking into account that the intrahousehold distribution of unemployment can be more relevant than aggregate unemployment in order to explain poverty changes. We also test the hypothesis of asymmetric effects of the business cycle on the share of poor individuals in the population. Our results show that unemployment has a positive impact on severe poverty, while inflation has a negative effect. Among the three unemployment measures considered in order to predict poverty, the percentage of households where all active members are unemployed registers the highest explanatory power. We also find that a change in unemployment has a larger effect on poverty during a period of economic recession than during a period of expansion.poverty forecasting, unemployment, system GMM model

Poverty and Women’s Labor Market Activity: the Role of Gender Wage Discrimination in the EU

The functioning of the labor market often has been stressed as a clear determinant in explaining poverty trends in developed countries. In this paper, we analyze the role of gender wage discrimination on household poverty rates in several EU countries, linking two related phenomena that rarely are analyzed together. In order to quantify the impact of discrimination on poverty, we propose the construction of a counterfactual distribution of wages where discrimination against women has been removed. Using this new wage distribution, we compute total household income and compare poverty rates in the absence of discrimination to those actually observed. Our results show that, in general, it is true that discrimination against women plays a determinant role in the current levels of poverty, even if we discover that results for each country present a different pattern and intensity. Further, we find that the effect of discrimination on poverty risk dramatically increases for individuals in households who largely depend on working female earnings, especially in the case of single mothers.poverty, inequality, income distribution, gender, wage discrimination, labor participation.