From austerity to prosperity? Migration and child poverty among mainland and island Puerto Ricans

Analyses of migrants' economic circumstances typically use the native-born in the destination as a comparison group. We use the 1990 Census Public Use Microdata Samples for the United States and Puerto Rico to demonstrate the benefits of a comparative approach that includes data from both the origin and the destination. Specifically, the primary objective is to determine how and why the risk of child poverty is associated with migration from Puerto Rico to the United States. The results show that migration reduces the risk of child poverty, partly because better jobs are available on the mainland. Employment, human capital, family structure, and public assistance cannot completely explain observed differences. The results also show that the economic benefits of migration continue for the native-born on the mainland and that return migration to Puerto Rico is associated with impoverishment.     

Do Income Surveys Overestimate Poverty in Western Europe? Evidence from a Comparison with Institutional Frameworks

Comparative poverty research flourishes,especially since comparable income data areeasily available through the Luxembourg IncomeStudy. However, widely-used income surveyssuffer from a number of methodological pitfallsfor comparative poverty research. This researchreport uses the data available in theLuxembourg Income Study for three countries –Germany, Sweden and the United Kingdom – toexemplify the limited comparability ofwidely-used income data used in povertyresearch. In a simple simulation exercise,entitlements to means-tested benefits areimputed for each household in the sample, basedon the institutional regulations in eachcountry. Compared to actual poverty rates inthe original sample, imputed poverty rates aremarkedly smaller, if not reduced to zero. Evenif one accounts for an incomplete take-up ofbenefits, a large gap between actual andsimulated poverty rates still remains, largelycaused by problems in survey design. The paperconcludes with a number of recommendations forimproving income surveys from the perspectiveof comparative poverty research.     

Migration of the poor

One aspect of migration which has been largely overlooked by researchers is the migration of people receiving public assistance benefits. The migration, or lack of migration, of these people has clear policy implications. Poor people put numerous demands on the locality where they reside, including demands for welfare benefits. The research presented in this paper reveals that movers receiving AFDC payments are able to improve their economic standing more than those who do not move. It is also shown that states with a net in-migration of public assistance recipients but net out-migration of non-recipients do have higher benefit levels than states with net out-migration of recipients and net in-migration of non-recipients. Employment and income data do not show the same differences between the state types.     

人口老龄化、老年贫困与养老保障--基于德国的数据与经验

人口老龄化及老年女性比重较高增加了老年贫困的概率。对此，德国主要采取两项对策避免老年贫困：养老保障是第一道防线，里斯特／吕鲁普养老金、最低养老金等都是重要的政策选项；社会救助提供了最后一道有效安全网。借鉴德国经验，中国应通过完善多支柱模式并逐步扩大第二支柱比重、养老保险参量改革、建立老年低收入群体收入保护机制、建立健全老年社会救助制度等措施来有效解决人口老龄化过程中老年人特别是老年低收入群体的养老保障问题，有效规避老年贫困风险。     

A historical survey of international migration of China population]

Chinese migration trends in various periods of China's history are discussed. From the earliest times to the present, migration patterns seem unique to each period: 1) Early period of emigration (Qin-Tang Dynasties): The earliest recorded instance of emigration occurred during the Qin dynasty when a traveler went to what is now the Philippines. In the following dynasties, even though migration was limited to religious men and merchants who went abroad and returned to China, the process of migrating was established. 2) Tang to Ming Dynasties (Self-initiated migration): Tang Dynasty records show the beginnings of Chinese residence abroad in Arabia. Land and sea travel developed further, and majority of emigres left China for political, religious or economic reasons. 3) Post-Ming Dynasty (Forced migration): This is a period beginning with the Opium War, where 2 groups, indentured servants and those who were able to purchase their own fare, emigrated as laborers because of necessity. The population on the coast, which had risen dramatically by the 1900's, was subject to war, official corruption, poverty and disease. Migration reached a peak between 1851-1875 when 1,280,000 Chinese left the country, settling mostly in Southeast Asia. Between 1847-1873, it is estimated that between 22%-64% perished along the way. 4) WWI-1949 (Motivated migration): The consequences of 2 world wars and the Great Depression were cause for another mass migration from China for political and economic reasons. This time, however, emigres were not limited to the very poor; also, a large number of overseas Chinese eventually returned to the mainland. Between 1930-34, 350,000 more Chinese returned than left. 5) Post-1949 (A new era): In the 1950s large numbers of overseas Chinese returned to the mainland. In 1978-82, over 4000 Chinese returned to Guangdong alone. A new phenomenon has appeared: migration tends to be limited to visits to relatives or to travel for pleasure or education.     

Population growth and poverty in the developing world

The links between rapid population growth and the absolute poverty currently affecting 780 million people in the developing countries (excluding China and other centrally planned economies) were examined. Absolute poverty is defined as having less than the income necessary to ensure a daily diet of 2150 calories per person ($200 per person a year in 1970 United States dollars). Focus is on poverty and demography in the developing world (defining poverty; income, fertility and life expectancy; demographic change and poverty), effect of poverty on fertility, family planning programs and the poor, and the outlook for the future. Rapid population growth stretches both national and family budgets thin with the increasing numbers of children to be fed and educated and workers to be provided with jobs. Slower per capita income growth, lack of progress in reducing income inequality, and more poverty are the probable consequences. Many characteristics of poverty can cause high fertility -- high infant mortality, lack of education for women in particular, too little family income to invest in children, inequitable shares in national income, and the inaccessibility of family planning. Experience in China, Indonesia, Taiwan, Colombia, Korea, Sri Lanka, Cuba and Costa Rica demonstrate that birthrates can decline rapidly in low income groups and countries when basic health care, education, and low-cost or free family planning services are made widely available.     

Estimates of the abortion demand of young and older teenagers

This study estimates the demand for abortion by younger (ages 15–17) and older (ages 18–19) teenagers. The empirical results show, for both age groups, abortion demand is price inelastic and a normal good with respect to income. Teenage abortion demand is also found to be positively related to labor force participation and state Medicaid funding and negatively related to religiosity and unemployment. State family planning programs, AFDC benefits, and parental involvement laws are found not to be significant determinants of teenage abortion demand.     

拓展选择主义：城市贫困救助目标的再定位

近年来，城市新贫困现象日渐凸出。以最低生活保障为基础的城市贫困救助体系在“设标”和“寻标”环节均存在缺陷，难以适应城市贫困形势发展的需要。城市贫困救助体系的改革必须对“谁是贫困者”“如何寻找贫困者”等问题进行重新回答，拓展选择的目标范围，更新工作思路，让更多贫困者受惠。     

Cross-cultural comparison of attitudes toward welfare-state programs: Path analysis with log-linear models

Many studies to date regarding public support for welfare-state programs do not have an adequate theoretical model and fail to consider differences in public support for contributory vs. means-tested programs. Moreover, these studies seldom take into account cross-cultural variations. This study presents and tests the validity of a three-tier model in which socio-economic variables influence social ideologies which, in turn, differentially affect support for contributory and means-tested programs. Using comparable data from two countries — Israel and the United States — a path analysis with log-linear models is applied, indicating that, while important cross-cultural differences exist, the model is generally confirmed.     

Immigration,Welfare Magnets and the Geography of Child Poverty in the United States

This study presents a detailed look at the immigration and internal migration dynamics of child poverty for US States based on the 1990 US census. It assesses the impact of two policy-relevant factors on the migration of poor children across States: (1) the role of high immigration levels as a potential push for native-born and longer-term resident poor children whose parents may be reacting to the economic competition or social costs in high immigration States; and (2) the role of State AFDC benefits as a potential pull for poor children who migrate with their parents to States with higher benefit levels. The results make plain that the interstate migration patterns of poverty children differ from those of nonpoverty children, especially among whites and blacks. Female-headed households show different inter-state migration patterns than those in married-couple households. However, a multivariate analysis which includes standard state-level economic attributes provides more support for an immigration push than for a welfare magnet pull in affecting the inter-state migration of poor children. The findings also show a demographic displacement of poor children occurring in high immigration States where the net out-migration of poor children is more than compensated by larger numbers of new immigrant children in poor families with different demographic attributes. Because of these migration dynamics, the demographic profile of the child poverty population will differ across States, suggesting the need for different strategies toward reducing child poverty at the State level.     

Welfare benefits and birth decisions of never-married women

For some time now, the out-of-wedlock birthrate has been increasing rapidly in the United States. This has prompted several states to propose (and in some cases, enact) legislation to deny access to higher AFDC benefits for families in which the mother gives birth while receiving AFDC. The authors investigate whether AFDC benefit levels are systematically related to the family-size decisions of never-married women. Using a bivariate probit model with state and time fixed effects, applied to Current Population Survey data for the years 1980–1988, it is found that the basic benefit level for a family of two (one adult and one child) and the incremental benefit for a second child positively affects the family size decisions of black and Hispanic women, but not of white women. The effects are concentrated among high school dropouts (no effects are found for high school graduates). The authors conclude that rather than to uniformly deny benefits to all AFDC women that bear children, a better targeted policy might be to alter the AFDC benefit structure in such a way as to encourage single mothers to complete high school. However, being a high school dropout might be a proxy for some other underlying characteristic of the woman, and encouraging women to complete high school who otherwise would not might have no effect whatsoever on nonmarital births.     

Welfare and Redistributive Effects of Social Assistance in the Global South

This paper presents an analysis of the recent evolution of social assistance in the developing world, looking at its complex typological configuration, which has interlinked with, and partly reflects the complex demographic and epidemiological transitions and rapid urbanization and economic convergence that many developing countries have exhibited over the past decades. The paper underscores the principles of the poverty focus of social assistance and presents an overview of existence evidence of first‐ and second‐order effects of social assistance, particularly in the domains of poverty, education, health, and labor markets. Moreover, the paper highlights the knowledge gaps with regard to the longer term and gender‐specific welfare effects of social assistance, and the redistributive effects, and the incentives and distortion mechanisms that transfer programs can generate in the labor and insurance markets.     

我国贫困人口标准再探讨

近几年,通过对我国10余个贫困县的考察,笔者认为:农村贫困人口标准过低,仅相当于国际贫困线确定的最低贫困人口标准的1/5,相当其贫困标准的1/10;相当于我国监狱囚犯生活标准的1/4,相当于美国贫困人口标准的1/50。贫困人口难以完成在当时社会一般的、正常状况下劳动力的再生产。农村贫困人口从2亿多减少到2000多万,主要不是扶贫工作所致,而是到城镇打工。依据马克思劳动力价值学说的基本原理,抓紧调整提高农村贫困人口标准,改进扶贫工作机制,对我国的长治久安和建设和谐社会的大局有利。     

Reform Brings Marked Increase in Quality of Life for Chinese

One of the most tangible benefits brought about by the reform and opening up program initiated in the end of 1978 by the late Deng Xiaoping has been the continual rise in the quality of life for the average Chinese people. This is evidenced by rising per capita incomes, poverty alleviation, better education for all, a sharp decrease in the Engel抯 coefficient, and a host of other indicators. Rising Incomes Since the 1980s, the Chinese economy has been growing at an average annual rate of…     

Relationship of infant mortality and community development

A researcher applied indirect estimation techniques to data from 352 rural villages from the 1978 Republic of the Philippines Fertility Survey to determine if community factors affect mortality of children 5 years old. Children with the highest mortality risks included those of the poor and least educated parents. For example, infant and child mortality stood at 203 among mothers with no education compared to 42 among those with at least a college education. In addition, infant and child mortality among husbands who were farmers was 111 whereas it was 28 among husbands who worked in professional and clerical jobs. Low cost health services and midwives were the health factors that had the greatest effect ion the probability of survival for children 5 years old, especially among the poor and least educated. For example, the probability of dying fell from 123-80 among the poor and 152-79 among the least educated if a dispensary was accessible and from 131-88 among the poor and 154-96 among the least educated if a midwife was accessible. Furthermore, adequate nutrition, better housing conditions, safe water, and sanitation also played a key role in reducing the probability of death. In terms of community development, only accessibility to a newspaper outlet the families were. On the other hand, the presence of electricity was significant only when education of the mother, occupation of the father, and region of residence were used as control variables. Thus the government should expand health care services to the rural population. Further, it should integrate health components in social and economic development programs     

When Twenty-Four Hours is not Enough: Time Poverty of Working Parents

Individuals can be money poor, time poor or both. While income is the most used indicator of poverty, broader indexes including non-monetary aspects of deprivation have been proposed and measured. As one such measure, our study focuses on the element of deprivation arising from the time deficit of many working people. The usual poverty threshold is calculated as the amount of income to buy the minimum required goods and services from the market. This minimum required purchase is greater for these people since they have less time than the average person to produce some goods and services for themselves at home. So, they need money to buy these in the market in order to maintain the same consumption. The income standard must be supplemented to adequately measure actual poverty. Time use data make it possible to establish time requirements and time availability and provide a measure of time poverty. Using Canadian GSS 1998 data, and building on the work of Vickery (1977, ‚The time poor: A new look at poverty’, The Journal of Human Resources 12(1), pp. 27-48) and of Douthitt (1993, ‚The inclusion of time availability in Canadian poverty measures’, Time-Use Methodology: Toward Consensus (ISTAT, Roma), pp. 83–91), and our own previous study, we estimate time-adjusted poverty thresholds and rates for single and dual parent Canadian families. As expected, we have found high incidence of time deficit among the employed single parents with children. We make a case for the acceptance of a redefined poverty standard for such time-deprived groups.     

"Struggling to Keep the Wolf from the Door"? Analysis of Rural Poverty Using a Consumption-Based Approach in West Belesa District,Ethiopia

Ethiopia has one of the highest poverty rates in the world where 24% of the population lives in extreme poverty. While urban poverty reduced from 26% in 2011 to 15% in 2016, rural poverty reduced only from 30 to 26% in the same periods. Improper identification of the rural poor and ill-understanding of the extent of rural poverty is among the challenges in designing appropriate poverty reduction interventions in rural areas. Thus, this study analyzes the extent of rural poverty employing a consumption-based approach and identifies the determinants of rural poverty at a household level. A household survey was conducted and data were randomly collected from 194 households from four representative villages in the west Belesa district of Ethiopia. The food and non-food consumption measurement calculated by the cost of basic need approach were 2949.40 ETB (ETB is Ethiopian Birr, which is the Ethiopian currency. 1 ETB is equivalent to 0.025 US$) and 1485.78 ETB per year per Adult Equivalent (AE), respectively. The rural poverty indices (i.e. headcount index, poverty gap, and squared poverty gap) calculated based on the consumption-based poverty line were 38.1, 8.84, and 3.1%, respectively. The binary logit analysis shows that having a bigger family had a significant and positive relationship with rural poverty. Conversely, larger landholding, plowing oxen, and livestock ownership as well as a higher amount of non/off-farm income have a significant and negative relationship with the poverty status of households. The study found that rural poverty is deep and complex in the study area calling for the design of location-specific and holistic poverty reduction strategies.

     

The Effect of State Transfers on Poverty in Post-Socialist Eastern Europe

During the market transition in Eastern Europe, social support mechanisms shifted from employment-based measures to means-tested ones. This restructuring, along with an overall decrease in social support and economic productivity and an increase in unemployment, meant that these payments were often inadequate to address the large rise in poverty during this period of time. Little research, however, considers whether individual-level payments were effective in reducing poverty. This paper considers the efficacy of these individual-level payments in Bulgaria, Hungary, and Romania, using two-wave panel data. It shows that state transfers to individuals reduced their poverty in all these countries. Thus, while the level of payments may have been inadequate to eliminate the adverse effects of the market transition, the payments themselves were beneficial to individuals and reduced their poverty.     

Multidimensional Poverty in Mountainous Regions: Shan and Chin in Myanmar

Poverty is complex and multidimensional. People living in mountainous regions are vulnerable and more likely to experience multiple deprivation. However, few studies have addressed multidimensional poverty in mountainous regions. Using data from 4290 households of poverty and vulnerability assessment survey and the Alkire–Foster methodology, this paper estimate and decompose multidimensional poverty in the states of Shan and Chin in Myanmar. The multidimensional poverty is measured in five dimensions and a set of twelve indicators. Nearly half of the population in Shan and three-quarters in Chin were multidimensionally poor. The average intensity of poverty was 44% in Chin and 38% in Shan. The multidimensional poverty index was 0.33 in Chin and 0.19 in Shan. The level of multidimensional poverty in Chin was similar to that in of Sub-Saharan Africa. In Chin, 60% of the population was both multidimensionally poor and consumption poor, but in Shan, it was 20%. About 28% of the population in Shan and 15% in Chin were multidimensionally poor but not consumption poor. Deprivation in education accounts for one-third of the multidimensional poverty in Shan; while deprivation in health accounts for one-third of the multidimensional poverty in Chin. A higher proportion of multidimensionally poor had experienced shocks such as the death of a household member, agricultural loss, or death of livestock compared to the multidimensional non-poor. Multidimensional poverty was significantly higher for rural household, households with lower educational attainment, consumption poor and among those who lived in Chin. Poverty reduction programs require a holistic understanding of poverty and its different dimensions as well as the main contributing factors for effective planning and program implementation. Geographical targeting of poverty reduction program and larger investment in food, health, water, energy and education can reduce the extent of multidimensional poverty in Shan and Chin.     

Welfare generosity, pregnancies and abortions among unmarried AFDC recipients

Even before the 1996 overhaul of the U.S. welfare system, a number of states had ended the practice of paying extra benefits to families who have additional children while receiving welfare. Proponents believe that this reform can reduce births to recipients, however many worry that it may encourage women to obtain abortions. Using a sample of unmarried AFDC recipients from the NLSY, we estimate a bivariate probit model of pregnancy and, conditional on becoming pregnant, the probability of abortion. Our results lend some support for the proposition that reducing incremental AFDC benefits will decrease pregnancies without increasing abortions. Received: 16 April 1998/Accepted: 11 March 1999