Spatial and Temporal Trends in Multidimensional Poverty in the United States over the Last Decade

This paper undertakes a comprehensive analysis of multidimensional poverty in the United States over the last decade. It provides estimates of multidimensional poverty over more than a decade, from 2008 to 2019, which covers the Great Recession and the recovery following the recession when major policy changes such as the Affordable Care Act were implemented. For the first time, spatial trends in estimates of multidimensional poverty are also provided. We measure annual poverty levels in 4 regions, 50 states and examine the relation between multidimensional poverty and neighborhood characteristics. We find that on average, 13 percent of the United States population was multidimensional poor. Poverty rates were high in the South and the West and among young adults, immigrants and Hispanics. Alternative indices of multidimensional poverty show consistent trends; multidimensional poverty in the United States rose between 2008 and 2010 and then gradually declined. However, more than a quarter of individuals with incomes above the poverty threshold remained multidimensional poor. This underscores the fact that income does not always capture deprivation experienced by individuals. Policies geared towards affordable housing, health insurance and higher education will help reduce multidimensional poverty in the United States.

     

Subjective Poverty and Its Relation to Objective Poverty Concepts in Hungary

The paper analyzes subjective poverty in Hungary and compares it to the objective poverty concepts. Subjective poverty is defined by examining who people consider to be poor. Based on the Easterlin paradox, the initial hypothesis states that subjective and absolute poverty concepts are highly correlated. Taking into account that Hungary is a developed country, subjective well-being is supposed to be associated not only with absolute, but also with relative deprivation. The methods of systematic data collection are used to collect data about the belief of the population. The paper concludes that low income level, Roma descent, entitlement to social supports and unemployment are the items thought to be most related to poverty by the informants. It proves that subjective poverty is a multidimensional concept. It also concludes that absolute and relative poverty thresholds coincide with the subjective one. It implies that increasing the absolute income level of individuals may not be enough to improve their subjective wellbeing as they are also concerned with their relative income position.     

Multidimensional Poverty in China: Findings Based on the CHNS

This paper estimates multidimensional poverty in China by applying the Alkire-Foster methodology to the China Health and Nutrition Survey 2000–2009 data. Five dimensions are included: income, living standard, education, health and social security. Results suggest that rapid economic growth has resulted not only in a reduction in income poverty but also in a reduction in multidimensional poverty in the last decade, both in terms of its prevalence and intensity. However, many challenges remain. There are wide disparities across provinces and between urban and rural areas, with poverty being 1.5 times higher in rural areas than in urban ones in 2009. Moreover, rising deprivation in education in rural and less developed provinces should also be a policymaking concern.     

Mapping Patterns of Multiple Deprivation and Well-Being using Self-Organizing Maps: An Application to Swiss Household Panel Data

The aim of this paper is to propose multidimensional measures of deprivation and wellbeing in contemporary Switzerland, in order to overcome the limitations of standard approaches. More precisely, we have developed self organising maps (SOM) using data drawn from the 2009 Swiss Household Panel wave, in order to identify highly homogeneous clusters of individuals characterized by distinct profiles across 44 indicators of deprivation and well-being. SOM is a vector quantiser that performs a topology-preserving mapping of the k-dimensional input data to a two-dimensional, rectangular grid of output units, preserving as much as possible the information contained in the original input data. “Topology-preserving” means that, when an SOM is properly developed, units that are close in the output space are also close in the input space. Our results suggest that the SOM approach could improve our understanding of complex and multidimensional phenomena, like those of well-being, deprivation, vulnerability, that show only a partial overlapping with standard income poverty measures.     

Material Deprivation and Working Poor in Hong Kong

In-work poverty is a growing problem in many developed economies. In Hong Kong, there were 200,700 working poor households in 2016, and approximately half of the total poor population in Hong Kong was living in those working poor households. A growing body of literature has examined the problem of the working poor, but most studies have used relative income as a measure of poverty. In this paper, we adopt the material deprivation approach for assessing the poverty situation of in-work poverty households in Hong Kong. We have interviewed 3565 workers in Hong Kong during a survey conduct in 2016. We compare the results of the material deprivation approach with those of the income poverty approach and evaluate the adequacy of the official income poverty line in gauging the situation of in-work poverty. Our findings reinforce existing studies indicating that deprivation offers an important complement to the income poverty line in poverty analysis. Our results show that there is a moderate overlap between workers identified as poor by the deprivation approach and by the income poverty line. And these two groups of workers have very different profiles. The results provide important policy implications for alleviating poverty among the working poor in Hong Kong.

     

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.     

Poverty,Inequality and Deprivation in South Africa: An Analysis of the 1993 SALDRU Survey

This paper analyses poverty and inequality in South Africa based on data from a comprehensive multi-purpose household survey undertaken in 1993 to provide baseline statistics on poverty and its determinants to the new government. The paper shows that South Africa has among the highest levels of income inequality in the world and compares poorly in most social indicators to countries with similar income levels. Much of the poverty in the country is a direct result of apartheid policies that denied equal access to education, employment, services, and resources to the black population of the country. As a result, poverty has a very strong racial dimension with poverty concentrated among the African population. In addition, poverty is much higher in rural areas, and particularly high in the former homelands. Poverty among female-headed households and among children is also higher than average. Moreover, poverty is closely related to poor education and lack of employment. The poor suffer from lack of access to education, quality health care, basic infrastructure, transport, are heavily indebted, have little access to productive resources, and are heavily dependent on remittances and social transfers, particularly social pensions and disability grants. The paper uses an income-based definition of poverty for most of the analysis. In addition, it develops a broad-based index of deprivation including income, employment, wealth, access to services, health, education, and perceptions of satisfaction as its components. While on average the two indicators correspond fairly closely, the income poverty measure misses a considerable number of people who are severely deprived in many of the non-income measures of well-being. This group of severely deprived not identified by the income poverty measure consists predominantly of Africans living in rural areas, concentrated particularly in the province of KwaZulu/Natal.     

Superimpose Material Deprivation Study on Poverty Old Age People in Hong Kong Study

Due to a range of shortcomings of income-based measures of poverty in older people, an alternative approach is proposed to counteract those shortcomings. Hong Kong index of material deprivation aims to identify a consensus-based list of goods and services that are necessities in society and to establish that these goods and services are not available due to their lack of affordability. This paper reports on the validation of Hong Kong index of material deprivation based on an approach proposed by Townsend (Poverty in the United Kingdom, Penguin Books, London, 1979) in Hong Kong. Through a survey of 2339 older Chinese people aged 65 and older, we found that a broad consensus regarding the necessities in their daily lives exists and Hong Kong index of material deprivation is a reliable and valid measure of poverty because its reliability and validity is good and acceptable. Finally, we have shown that the overlap between the poor in terms of income and the deprived is moderate and the profiles of those who are core poor (both poor in terms of income and the deprived) are more similar to those who are deprived than those who are poor in terms of income. Hong Kong index of material deprivation index has been developed, which offers a supplementary measure of poverty other than income poor and provides future avenues for improved understandings of poverty in old age.     

Uneven dynamics and regional disparity of multidimensional poverty in China

Qualifying the official minimum of “Two no worries and three guarantees” (certainty of food and clothing, guarantees of compulsory education, basic medical care, and housing) is essential to evaluate the targeted poverty alleviation program since 2013 in China. Using the poverty monitoring dataset and the multidimensional poverty indicator system, the uneven dynamics and regional disparity of multidimensional poverty and its driving factors in poverty-stricken areas in China during 2014–2018 are explored in this paper. The incidence rate of multidimensional poverty was reduced by 61.72%, and the poverty reduction rate within the six dimensions ranged from 52.29 to 76.36%. Multidimensional poverty and its six dimensions displayed narrowing regional disparity. Impoverished and moderately poor areas shrank, whereas low-poverty areas expanded. All 22 provinces have become low-poverty areas in 2018. The contribution of each dimension to multidimensional poverty varies for different types at different stages. Income and expenditure contribute the most to poverty status, followed by transportation, housing conditions, education, communication, and medical care and health. The contribution of each indicator among different dimensions varied with different trends from 2014 to2018. This paper helps incorporate the official minimums of “Two no worries and three guarantees” into a more operational evaluation system to promote sustainable policies for governments at all levels by 2020 and beyond, as well as provide valuable references for poverty alleviation in other developing countries worldwide.

     

Family Structure and Children’s Economic Well-Being: Incorporating Same-Sex Cohabiting Mother Families

Research on family structure and child well-being rarely includes children in same-sex parent families, a notable omission since 28 % of female–female couple households contain children. Using the 2010–2013 pooled current population survey (CPS), we examined children’s economic well-being by family structure. These data were ideal for this study because they included a sizeable number of children in same-sex cohabiting mother families and the CPS measured both official and supplemental poverty, incorporating the cohabiting partner. Using the official poverty measure, children in same-sex cohabiting mother families were more likely to be poor than their counterparts in either different-sex cohabiting or married parent families. Using the supplemental poverty measure, children in same-sex mother families were no more likely to be poor than children in all other types of different-sex two-parent families.     

Multidimensional Measurement of Poverty Among Women in Sub-Saharan Africa

Since the seminal work of Sen, poverty has been recognized as a multidimensional phenomenon. The recent availability of relevant databases renewed the interest in this approach. This paper estimates multidimensional poverty among women in fourteen Sub-Saharan African countries using the Alkire and Foster multidimensional poverty measures, whose identification method is based on a counting approach. Four dimensions are considered: assets, health, schooling and empowerment. The results show important differences in poverty among the countries of the sample. The multidimensional poverty estimates are compared with some alternative measures such as the Human Development Index, income poverty, asset poverty and the Gender-related Development Index. It is found that including additional dimensions into the analysis leads to country rankings different from those obtained with the mentioned four measures. Decompositions by geographical area and dimension indicate that rural areas are significantly poorer than urban ones and that a lack of schooling is, in general, the highest contributor to poverty. The paper also conducts robustness and sensitivity analyses of the multidimensional estimates with respect to the number of dimensions in which deprivation is required in order to be considered poor, as well as to the poverty lines within each dimension. Several cases of dominance between countries are found in the first robustness test.     

A Review of the Literature on Fuel Poverty with a Focus on Ireland

Fuel poverty has become a more prescient issue in recent years, both due to harsher winters and the economic downturn, which has made heating the home more difficult for many. Fuel poverty is sensitive to energy prices and also has a capital component linked to the energy efficiency of the home and its appliances. In 2013, 16 % of Irish individuals were recorded as being deprived of heating in the previous year, while 10 % were recorded as being unable to keep the home adequately warm. The data shows that fuel poverty has increased markedly since 2009. In this article, we review the literature on fuel poverty including the definition and measurement of fuel poverty, as well as the impacts on health and well-being. We also examine current policy initiatives aimed at alleviating fuel poverty and this is undertaken with a special focus on Ireland.     

Childhood and Capability Deprivation in Germany: A Quantitative Analysis Using German Socio-Economic Panel Data

Child poverty has been widely discussed in Germany since the publication of the third official Poverty and Wealth Report of the German government in 2008 which—inter alia—focused on the situation of children and families. However, child poverty is not only caused by low household incomes and impacts of child poverty are not only restricted to financial consequences. The capability approach takes into account this multidimensionality of well-being and poverty of children. It conceptualizes human well-being as not only depending on financial means but also gives the same importance to the personal and social conversion factors which determine how far financial means can be converted into personal well-being. Before 2008 the capability approach had only been applied to the well-being of adults in Germany, but not specifically to the well-being of children. However, there are several reasons why a capability analysis for children will differ from a capability analysis for adults. Adults’ capability sets comprise dimensions that are less relevant for small children while other valuable capabilities have to be added. Furthermore the capability set depends to a large extent on the age of the child. The paper focuses on a multidimensional poverty analysis in the capability perspective of 5–6 years old children. In the domains of “Education/Leisure”, “Health”, “Social Participation” and “Income” child poverty is measured by predefined indicators. The relationship to the social and personal conversion factors of the caretakers is then evaluated. Additionally, a multidimensional poverty measure is analyzed.     

The Multidimensionality of Child Poverty: Evidence from Afghanistan

This paper examines multidimensional poverty among children in Afghanistan using the Alkire-Foster method. Several previous studies have underlined the need to separate children from their adult nexus when studying poverty and treat them according to their own specificities. From the capability approach, child poverty is understood to be the lack of freedom to do and to be what children themselves value and have reason to value. The case of Afghanistan is particularly relevant as years of conflict aggravated by several severe droughts, political insecurity, bad governance and ongoing violence have significantly increased poverty in the country. The paper discusses the relevant dimensions when analysing child poverty and uses data from a survey carried out by Handicap International which contains information on dimensions of children’s wellbeing that is typically missing in standard surveys. Ten dimension are considered in this paper: health, care and love, material deprivation, food security, social inclusion, education, freedom from economic and non-economic exploitation, shelter and environment, autonomy, and mobility. Our results show that younger children, those living in rural areas, girls and disabled children are the most deprived.     

Multidimensional Targeting: Identifying Beneficiaries of Conditional Cash Transfer Programs

Conditional cash transfer programs (CCTs) have two main objectives: reducing poverty and increasing the human capital of children. To reach these objectives, transfers are given to poor households conditioned on investments in their children’s education, health, and nutrition. Targeting mechanisms used by CCTs have been generally successful in identifying the income poor but have not fared as well in identifying households that under-invest in human capital. These mechanisms do not consider the multidimensional aspect of poverty, even when composite measures are used, as they do not capture each dimension-specific deprivation. This paper proposes a multidimensional targeting approach to identifying beneficiaries that explicitly takes into consideration the multiple objectives of CCTs and the multiple deprivations of the poor household. Results indicate that the proposed multidimensional targeting methodology significantly improves the selection of households with children who are most deprived in the dimensions often relevant to CCTs. In the case of Mexico’s Oportunidades, ex-ante evaluation results indicate that the multidimensional identification of beneficiaries increases the impact of transfers on school attendance compared to alternative targeting models.     

Improving Well-Being in Bhutan: A Pursuit of Happiness or Poverty Reduction?

Increasing happiness is a key priority for the Bhutanese government. This priority displaces more traditional (economic) objectives such as the pursuit of income growth and the reduction of income poverty. This paper examines the implications of this approach by examining whether there are common correlates of the four following measures of human well-being in Bhutan: income poverty; multidimensional poverty; perceived poverty; and happiness. Our findings suggest that whilst there is a degree of commonality, determinants of the different measures of well-being are distinct. Common factors include having a savings account, levels of literacy and household size. Further we show that higher levels of income poverty, multidimensional poverty and perceived poverty are found to be negatively associated with happiness. Importantly, our findings suggest that a focus on increasing happiness might come at the expense of improving other measures of wellbeing.     

Relative Economic Position and Subjective Well-Being in a Poor Society: Does Relative Position Indicator Matter?

Concern for relative income (or status in general) may have important implications for poverty and individual well-being. This paper examines the impact of relative economic position on individual’s level of well-being among poor communities in rural Ethiopia. The analysis uses a self-reported measure of overall life-evaluation as a measure of individual well-being. Despite the fact that well-being is multidimensional, the impact of non-money metric measures of relative economic position on individual well-being has not been given a lot of attention in the literature. In this study, relative economic position is measured using consumption data, asset index, and respondent’s own perception of relative wealth. The asset index captures the non-monetary dimensions of economic welfare, including education, physical assets, and social capital. We use data from the 2004 and 2009 waves of the Ethiopia Rural Household Survey and employ a multilevel modelling technique to account for individual and group level heterogeneity in our empirical analysis. We find no significant relationship between individual well-being and relative economic position measured with in consumption terms. In contrast, we do find a significant negative impact of relative position on individual well-being when we use asset indices and respondent’s own perception of relative wealth to measure relative economic position. Our findings suggest that when individuals compare themselves with others, they evaluate various aspects of their life, including their financial conditions, asset holdings, and social relations, which are hardly captured by consumption or income data in many poor countries.     

Capability Deprivation and Income Poverty in the United States, 1994 and 2004: Measurement Outcomes and Demographic Profiles

Shifting focus from income to capability signifies an important milestone toward accurately measuring poverty and deprivation. This paper operationalizes capability deprivation in the United States and compares measurement outcomes among various capability approaches and between capability and income spaces. Of the three capability approaches examined, the factor score absolute approach suggests a greater extent of deprivation and more comprehensive demographic profiles of the deprived. Additionally, I find that using the capability space may further attenuate the extent of deprivation over that using the income space and alter somewhat the stereotypical profiles of the poor and deprived.     

Income and Beyond: Multidimensional Poverty in Six Latin American Countries

This paper studies multidimensional poverty for Argentina, Brazil, Chile, El Salvador, Mexico and Uruguay for the period 1992–2006. The approach overcomes the limitations of the two traditional methods of poverty analysis in Latin America (income-based and unmet basic needs) by combining income with five other dimensions: school attendance for children, education of the household head, sanitation, water and shelter. The results allow a fuller understanding of the evolution of poverty in the selected countries. Over the study period, El Salvador, Brazil, Mexico and Chile experienced significant reductions in multidimensional poverty. In contrast, in urban Uruguay there was a small reduction in multidimensional poverty, while in urban Argentina the estimates did not change significantly. El Salvador, Brazil and Mexico, and rural areas of Chile display significantly higher and more simultaneous deprivations than urban areas of Argentina, Chile and Uruguay. In all countries, deprivation in access to proper sanitation and education of the household head are the highest contributors to overall multidimensional poverty.     

The Impact of Adaptive Preferences on Subjective Indicators: An Analysis of Poverty Indicators

Subjective indicators are often criticized since they are thought to be particularly affected by the phenomenon of adaptive preferences and social comparison. For social policy purposes, processes of downward adaptation in disadvantaged individuals are of particular importance, i.e., it is supposed that such people compare themselves with others who are in the same precarious situation or even worse off and, as a result, lower their expectations and adapt their aspirations and preferences to their material and financial constraints. Based on the 2006–2010 waves of the Swiss Household Panel study, this contribution examines whether, and to what degree, indicators of material deprivation, subjective poverty and subjective well-being are affected by such downward adaptations. Our empirical analysis demonstrates that the bias caused by adaptation processes varies considerably among different measures and that, although subjective indicators are indeed often affected by this phenomenon, there are also robust measures, notably Townsend’s deprivation measure, Halleröd’s proportional deprivation index and the subjective well-being measure of general life satisfaction.