Chapter 1 - Handbook on Poverty + Inequality PDF

Preview

Summary

Chapter 1 required reading notes for topic 1 on poverty measurement...

Description

Chapter 1    

Poverty is pronounced deprivation in well being People could be house poor, food poor or health poor. These dimensions of poverty can be me measured directly e.g. literacy rates 4 reasons to measure poverty: 1) To keep poor people on the agenda 2) To be able to identify poor people and so to be able to target appropriate interventions 3) To monitor and evaluate projects and policy interventions geared to poor people 4) To evaluate the effectiveness of institutions whose goal is to help poor people

Concepts of well-being and poverty  

   

The main question on poverty is whether households or individuals have enough resources to meet their needs. Approach to well being: 1) Well-being thought as the command over commodities in general. Hence poverty is typically measured by comparing individuals income or consumption with some defined thresholds below which they are considered to be poor. 2) 2nd approach is asking whether people are able to obtain a specific type of consumption good e.g. food, shelter etc. 3) Amartya Sen argues that well-being comes from a capability to function in society. Thus poverty arises when people lack certain capabilities Nutritional poverty can be measured to see whether children are stunted or waster Educational poverty might be measure by asking whether people are literate Inequality focus on the distribution of attributes such as income, consumption across the whole population. Vulnerability is the risk of falling into poverty in the future, even if the person is not necessarily poor now. This is a key dimension of well being since it affects individuals’ behaviour in terms of investments, production patterns etc, Why measure poverty?





Keeping poor people on the agenda  Ravallion (1998) argues a credible measure of poverty can be a powerful instrument for focusing the attentions of policy makers on the living conditions of the poor.  Hence the measurement of poverty is necessary if its to appear on the political and economic agenda. Targeting Domestic and Worldwide Interventions

Poverty profile – sets out major facts on poverty, then examines the pattern of poverty to see how it varies by geography, by community characteristics and by households characteristics  A poverty profile supports efforts to target development resources toward poorer areas  A good poverty profile also makes employment targeting possible. In Cambodia the highest poverty rate was fund among people living in households headed by farmers  This suggests that policies that aim to reduce poverty do this thorugh enhancing income generating capabilities  Relationship between education and poverty is important  Raising education attainment is a high priority to improve living standards and reduce poverty  Also looking at gender and poverty may be important. In cambodia, the poverty rate is slightly lower among female headed households then mele headed households.  Targeting is also important on a worldwide level since agencis such as the World Bank have limited resources  Successful efforts to target policies and programs to help poor require an understanding of why they are poor. Monitoring and Evaluating Project and Policy Interventions  Predict the ffecti of and then evaluate policies and programs  Rigorous analysis of this kind is needed both to improve the deisgn of project and programs  Info on households and their economic status is collected to assess who uses public services and who gains from gov subsidies.  Using information on poverty, one can simulate the impact of different policies. Evaluating the Effectiveness of Institutions  Measuring the success of the institution’s in achieving the goal od reducing poverty  We want to know whether poverty has fallen and by how much – this is hard to calculate and is not robust 





      

Thinking systematically: Poverty reduction Strategy Papers Measurement is necessary but not sufficient World Bank favours ‘ Poverty Reduction Stretgy Paper’ process. First introduces for highly indebted poor countries (HIPC), this approach sets out a long term strategy for fighting poverty Idea is that leaders and adminstrators shoulf take the leasding in developing PRSP so that it is ‘owned’ locally rather then imposed externally. Begins with measurement of poverty, followed by an analysis of its dimensions and causes Expectation after this is that there will be extensive dialogue about what needs to be done Poverty measurement and diagnostics are therefore central to informing policy making for poverty reduction....