On multidimensional poverty rankings of binary attributes

We address the problem of ranking distributions of attributes in terms of poverty, when the attributes are represented by binary variables. To accomplish this task, we identify a suitable notion of “multidimensional poverty line” and characterize axiomatically the Head-Count and the Attribute-Gap poverty rankings, which are the natural counterparts of the most widely used income poverty indices. Finally, we apply our methodology and compare our empirical results with those obtained with some other well-known poverty measures.     

基于IPA方法的会展旅游者满意度研究——以广交会和广州博览会为例

会展业是旅游业中增长最快的行业之一,而广州是我国最主要的会展城市之一。以广交会和广州博览会为例,在分析影响会展旅游者目的地选择的主要因素的基础上,评估会展旅游者对广州目的地在这些方面的满意程度。结果表明,城市形象与环境、休闲娱乐设施、饭店与展览设施、可达性与饭店价格和花费与会议设施是影响会展旅游者是否参加展览的主要方面;会展旅游者对广州目的地感知的重要因素与目的地表现存在显著差异。同时,IPA结果发现,21个因素中有2个因素位于改进区,10个因素落入优势区,8个因素位于机会区以及1个因素落入维持区。     

民族地区巩固拓展脱贫成果的困境及路径选择——来自宁夏的实证分析

民族地区、生态脆弱地区和深度贫困地区高度耦合,这是巩固拓展脱贫攻坚成果的最大制约瓶颈。以宁夏为例,构建熵值TOPSIS与耦合协调度等模型,结合贫困性分析,从时空视角探讨了农户居住环境脆弱性与其贫困间的耦合协调的关联。结果显示：从时序看,农户居住环境脆弱性与其贫困间的耦合协调度总体呈下降趋势,受政策调整等因素影响历经了中度耦合协调贫困滞后、高度耦合协调同步发展2种阶段和4种发展类型。从空间分布看,宁夏北部川区至南部山区的农户居住环境脆弱性与其贫困间的耦合协调度整体呈上升趋势,耦合协调发展类型亦从协调发展型向过度调和型转变。这意味着新时期的脱贫成果巩固拓展要与乡村振兴相结合,走绿色可持续的高质量发展之路。     

Poverty and Income Dynamics in Philippine Villages, 1985–2004

The authors examined the long‐term changes in household income structure and decline in poverty in three rice‐growing villages in the rural Philippines from 1985 to 2004. They found a shift of household income structure away from farm to nonfarm sources, accompanied by a decline in the incidence of poverty by about one‐half. Such a decline can be explained primarily by the rise in returns to the “quantity” attributes of human capital, measured by age composition, and, secondly, by the rise in returns to the “quality” attributes, measured by the proportion of household members completing secondary and tertiary schooling. It is clear that the poor benefited from the development of the nonfarm labor market where they were able to fully utilize their only asset, that is unskilled labor.     

MEASURING THE ATTRIBUTES OF POVERTY AND ITS PERSISTENCE: A CASE STUDY OF ERITREA

This paper tries to identify the correlates of poverty in urban Eritrea using an estimation technique (the DOGEV model) that also allows for the inclusion of a measure of “persistence” in poverty levels from cross‐sectional estimation. The results suggest that 17 percent of the probability of being moderately poor and 22 percent of the probability of being extremely poor in Eritrea was attributable to this “persistence”—a predisposition toward poverty likely due to latent attributes related to past experience of poverty itself. The results also suggest that, in the post‐war economy of the mid‐1990s, those with vocational training fared best among all education groups. Being a war veteran also had a strong negative association with the poverty—reflecting successful attempts to support that group. The receipt of remittances also reduced the likelihood of poverty; though receipts from outside Eritrea had a much stronger effect than receipts from within Eritrea.     

Geography and Poverty Traps

We test the view that the large differences in income levels we see across the world are due to differences in the intrinsic geography of each country against the alternative view that there are poverty traps. We reject simple geographic determinism in favor of a poverty trap model with high- and low-level equilibria. The high-level equilibrium state is found to be the same for all countries while income in the low-level equilibrium, and the probability of being in the high-level equilibrium, are greater in cool, coastal countries with high, year-round, rainfall.     

Ethically robust comparisons of bidimensional distributions with an ordinal attribute

We provide foundations for robust normative evaluation of distributions of two attributes, one of which is cardinally measurable and transferable between individuals and the other is ordinal and non-transferable. The result that we establish takes the form of an analogue to the standard Hardy–Littlewood–Pólya theorem for distributions of one cardinal attribute. More specifically, we identify the transformations of the distributions which guarantee that social welfare increases according to utilitarian unanimity provided that the utility function is concave in the cardinal attribute and that its marginal utility with respect to the same attribute is non-increasing in the ordinal attribute. We establish that this unanimity ranking of the distributions is equivalent to the ordered poverty gap quasi-ordering introduced by Bourguignon [12]. Finally, we show that, if one distribution dominates another according to the ordered poverty gap criterion, then the former can be derived from the latter by means of an appropriate and finite sequence of such transformations.     

Small business and entrepreneurship in the knowledge economy: A comparison of Australia and Sweden

Dominant explanations within the existing development literature for the differences in poverty levels around the world have tended to ignore the influence of international inequality on poverty, instead focusing solely on domestic factors. In this paper, I conduct a regression analysis of the effect of inequality between countries on world poverty between 1980 and 2007, employing a new structural measure of international inequality which is created using social network analysis to calculate countries' positions in international trade networks. Countries' infant mortality rates are used to measure poverty. The results of the empirical analysis provide cross-country evidence to demonstrate that structural inequalities in the international system have a significant impact on poverty around the world. As such, the analysis demonstrates the need to move beyond focusing exclusively on domestic attributes of developing countries towards considering the broader international political economy in analysing contemporary poverty.     

Growth,inequality, and poverty reduction in developing countries: Recent global evidence

The study presents comparative global evidence on the transformation of economic growth to poverty reduction in developing countries, with emphasis on the role of income inequality. The focus is on the period since the early-mid-1990s when growth in these countries as a group has been relatively strong, surpassing that of the advanced economies. Both regional and country-specific data are analyzed for the $1.25 and $2.50-level poverty headcount ratios using World Bank Povcalnet data. The study finds that on average income growth has been the major driving force behind both the declines and increases in poverty. The study, however, documents substantial regional and country differences that are masked by this ‘average’ dominant-growth story. While in the majority of countries, growth was the major factor behind falling or increasing poverty, inequality, nevertheless, played the crucial role in poverty behavior in a large number of countries. And, even in those countries where growth has been the main driver of poverty-reduction, further progress could have occurred under relatively favorable income distribution. For more efficient policymaking, therefore, idiosyncratic attributes of countries should be emphasized. In general, high initial levels of inequality limit the effectiveness of growth in reducing poverty while growing inequality increases poverty directly for a given level of growth. It would seem judicious, therefore, to accord special attention to reducing inequality in certain countries where income distribution is especially unfavorable. Unfortunately, the present study also points to the limited effects of growth and inequality-reducing policies in low-income countries.     

Poverty traps,aid, and growth

This paper examines the empirical relevance of the poverty trap view of underdevelopment. We calibrate simple aggregate growth models in which poverty traps can arise due to either low saving or low technology at low levels of development. We then assess the empirical relevance of these specific mechanisms and their consequences for policy. We find little evidence of the existence of poverty traps based on these two mechanisms. When put to the task of explaining the persistence of low income in African countries, the models require either unreasonable values for key parameters, or else generate counterfactual predictions regarding the relations between key variables. These results call into question arguments in favour of a large scaling-up of aid to the poorest countries that are premised on the existence of such poverty traps.     

Valuations of aircraft noise: experiments in stated preference

The aim of this paper is to report new evidence relating to residents’ valuations of aircraft noise in three countries with an emphasis on a comparison of the valuations obtained using two contrasting approaches. One might be regarded as a standard stated choice approach offering pairwise comparisons of two alternatives characterised by a limited number of attributes. The other choice format adopted is innovative in drawing inspiration from the priority evaluator approach to embed aircraft movements alongside a wide range of other local factors that impact on residents’ quality of life. The paper addresses the differences in the results of the two approaches and explores the possible explanations for these variations. Although not conclusive, there is a suspicion that strategic bias may have influenced the results and we urge further research regarding incentives to such bias.     

贫困按要素分解:方法与例证

本文构建了两个贫困分解框架,一个用于分解贫困的水平,另一个用于分解贫困的变化,这两个方法的独特之处是建立了贫困与生产要素(即资源禀赋)总量及其分配之间的数量关系。具体地说,一个给定的贫困发生率可以被分解为要素或资源短缺的贡献,外加要素分配不均等的贡献。贫困发生率的变化则可分解为由要素的水平变化引起的,或由要素的不均等分配变化引起的。将这两种分解方法用于中国农村的数据,我们发现要素的不均等分配而非资源短缺是导致贫困和贫困变化的主要原因。     

A SYNTHESIS OF POVERTY LINE DEFINITIONS*

A fundamental point of discussion in poverty research is whether poverty is an absolute or a relative concept. If poverty is seen to be a situation of absolute deprivation, a poverty line will usually be defined to be independent of the general style of living in society. If poverty is considered to be a situation of relative deprivation, a poverty line will be defined in relation to the general style of living in society. The choice for one of these two approaches has important consequences for social policy, as absolute poverty may be reduced by economic growth, while relative poverty will only decrease when income inequality decreases. This paper suggests a poverty line definition that is not a priori meant to be either absolute or relative, but depends on the perception of poverty in society. If the poverty line is higher in countries with higher median income (as an indicator of “general style of living”) the poverty line is said to be relative; if the poverty line does not vary with median income, it is said to be absolute. The poverty line definition suggested appears to be a generalization of almost all well-known poverty line definitions. Poverty lines thus defined are estimated for eight European countries on the basis of a 1979 survey. The resulting lines appear to have an elasticity with respect to median income of 0.51, and hence can be said to be halfway on the scale between absolute and relative.     

How best to link poverty reduction and debt sustainability in IMF–World Bank models?

This paper attempts to provide an economic model in the context of developing countries to address the policy strategies related to poverty reduction. With a view to deal with the shortcomings of the existing approaches as regards poverty reduction, this paper develops a model on the basis of the policy framework of the IMF and the World Bank to show how demand growth can be a crucial mechanism in determining the potential rate of growth, and then to suggest ways in which poverty—conceptualised officially in absolute terms with a subjective cut‐off point (e.g. US $1/$2 a day), and a new objective measure in terms of consumption deprivation—can be linked with the key policy variables contained in the adjustment programmes. A strategy of investment in infrastructure and in human development, and improving access to credit markets, particularly in rural areas to encourage or ‘crowd in’ private investment is a precondition for growth and poverty alleviation. Debt relief can only provide a temporary, not a sustainable, solution to the problem of reducing poverty.     

Sensitivity of Willingness to Pay Estimates to the Level of Attributes in Discrete Choice Experiments

This paper considers issues raised in the application of discrete choice experiments (DCEs) to estimating willingness to pay (WTP). The main issue addressed is the sensitivity of WTP estimates to the level of attributes. A DCE, concerned with preferences for alternative cervical screening programmes, was carried out with women in the Tayside area of Scotland. A split sample design was employed in which respondents were divided into two groups. Each group received a discrete choice questionnaire that varied with respect to the levels of three of the six attributes. The price attribute was one of the attributes that varied across questionnaires. Whilst estimated coefficients were not significantly different across five of the six attributes included in the experiment, mean WTP estimates were significantly different for four of the five welfare estimates. However, from a policy point of view, such a difference may not be important. Consideration is also given to other general methodological and policy issues that are raised when using DCEs to estimate WTP. The findings suggest the need for further research into the design and application of DCEs as a method for estimating WTP.     

INFERENCE FOR DOMINANCE RELATIONS

The use of partial orders has been popularized as a way to conduct social evaluations using only minimal normative assumptions. Generically, this process involves comparing continuously indexed curves that are uniquely determined by the cumulative distributions of the individual attributes under study. In the literature on income poverty and inequality, for example, pairwise comparisons of entire income distributions and their respective Lorenz curves are routinely performed in order to characterize rankings of poverty, inequality, and welfare. In this article, we focus on the inferential problem that arises whenever such comparisons are made in the absence of census data. Statistical inference in these situations is particularly complex due to the fact that comparing curves invariably gives rise to four possibilities: the true population curves are equal, the first curve lies below the second, the second lies below the first, or the curves cross. To address this four‐decision problem, we introduce a two‐stage test that has good power and fine control over misclassification error rates.     

TEMPORARY AND PERSISTENT POVERTY AMONG ETHNIC MINORITIES AND THE MAJORITY IN RURAL CHINA

Poverty among ethnic minorities and the majority in rural China for the years 2000, 2001 and 2002 is investigated, taking a dynamic view and using a large sample covering 22 provinces. Based on the National Bureau of Statistics' low income line, almost one-third of the ethnic minorities experienced poverty during the three years studied while the corresponding proportion among the ethnic majority was only about half as high. Still, by far most of the poor in rural China belong to the ethnic majority. The relatively high poverty rates for ethnic minorities in rural China are found to be due to higher rates of entry than for the majority, while differences in exit rates across ethnicities are few. To a large extent, ethnic poverty differences can be attributed to differences in location, together with temporary and persistent poverty in rural China having a very clear spatial character. Poverty is concentrated in the western region and villages with low average income. Determinants of persistent and temporary poverty in rural China differ due to location as well as household characteristics.     

INEQUALITY AND POVERTY IN JAPAN*

This paper presents a brief survey of inequality and poverty in Japan. It shows empirical evidence on the extent of both inequality in income distribution and of poverty rates; the paper discusses the cause of increases in both these variables, and the implication of such trends. The paper goes on to argue the difference between inequality of opportunity and inequality of outcome and shows some related empirical evidence. Finally, the paper investigates the relationship between economic efficiency and equity, supposed to be in a trade‐off relationship, and presents my personal view of that relationship and policy recommendations.     

农村公共工程的扶贫效益——基于联立方程的分析

个人和家庭特征对贫困的影响相对较小是中国农村贫困的一个显著特点。因此针对公共利益的公共投资对消除贫困和缩小地区差距具有重要意义。公共投资也需要讲究效益,本文在分析贫困者参与农村公共工程的成本收益和农村公共工程扶贫效益影响因素的基础上,总结出农村公共工程扶贫效益的总方程式。农村公共工程的效益从成本收益上看,是由贫困者参与农村公共工程的收益和成本来决定的;从影响因素上看。农村公共工程扶贫效益是农村公共工程的目标选择、位置效应、时间效应、覆盖面、漏出效应、挤出效应、资金使用效率及其他因素共同起作用的结果。可以通过提高公共投资资源的使用效率、增强贫困人口的脱贫意识等途径提高农村公共工程的效益。     

Poverty,competition, democracy,and ownership: A general equilibrium model with vertical preferences

We consider a general equilibrium model where individuals are simultaneously workers, consumers, and shareholders, with two possible market structures: Monopoly and Duopoly, and two extreme ownership structures: egalitarian and concentrated. Considering three standard poverty indicators, the questions are, whether more competition generates more or less poverty for a given ownership structure; and whether a democratic choice between Monopoly and Duopoly leads to the alternative with less poverty. When the ownership is concentrated, we show that Duopoly generates less poverty than Monopoly and the majority votes for the alternative with less poverty. When the ownership is egalitarian, Duopoly may generate more or less poverty and democratic choice alleviates poverty regarding at least one poverty indicator and worsens poverty regarding at least another one, the three poverty indicators never converging. An empirical study on the effect of competition on poverty supports to some extent our theoretical findings.