Societal Poverty : A Relative and Relevant Measure

Poverty lines are typically higher in richer countries, and lower in poorer ones, reflecting the relative nature of national assessments of who is considered poor. In many high-income countries, poverty lines are explicitly relative, set as a share...

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Main Authors:	Jolliffe, Dean, Prydz, Espen Beer
Format:	Working Paper
Language:	English en_US
Published:	World Bank, Washington, DC 2017
Subjects:	POVERTY POVERTY MEASUREMENT INEQUALITY RELATIVE POVERTY POVERTY LINE
Online Access:	http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/133671495562984832/Societal-poverty-a-relative-and-relevant-measure http://hdl.handle.net/10986/26845

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recordtype	oai_dc
spelling	okr-10986-268452021-06-08T14:42:46Z Societal Poverty : A Relative and Relevant Measure Jolliffe, Dean Prydz, Espen Beer POVERTY POVERTY MEASUREMENT INEQUALITY RELATIVE POVERTY POVERTY LINE Poverty lines are typically higher in richer countries, and lower in poorer ones, reflecting the relative nature of national assessments of who is considered poor. In many high-income countries, poverty lines are explicitly relative, set as a share of mean or median income. Despite systematic variation in how countries define poverty, global poverty counts are based on fixed-value lines. To reflect national assessments of poverty in a global headcount of poverty, this paper proposes a societal poverty line. The proposed societal poverty line is derived from 699 harmonized national poverty lines, and has an intercept of $1 per day and a relative gradient of 50 percent of median national income or consumption. The societal poverty line is more closely aligned with national definitions of poverty than other proposed relative lines. By this relative measure, societal poverty has fallen steadily since 1990, but at a much slower pace than absolute extreme poverty. 2017-06-02T17:25:10Z 2017-06-02T17:25:10Z 2017-05 Working Paper http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/133671495562984832/Societal-poverty-a-relative-and-relevant-measure http://hdl.handle.net/10986/26845 English en_US Policy Research Working Paper;No. 8073 CC BY 3.0 IGO http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/igo World Bank World Bank, Washington, DC Publications & Research Publications & Research :: Policy Research Working Paper
repository_type	Digital Repository
institution_category	Foreign Institution
institution	Digital Repositories
building	World Bank Open Knowledge Repository
collection	World Bank
language	English en_US
topic	POVERTY POVERTY MEASUREMENT INEQUALITY RELATIVE POVERTY POVERTY LINE
spellingShingle	POVERTY POVERTY MEASUREMENT INEQUALITY RELATIVE POVERTY POVERTY LINE Jolliffe, Dean Prydz, Espen Beer Societal Poverty : A Relative and Relevant Measure
relation	Policy Research Working Paper;No. 8073
description	Poverty lines are typically higher in richer countries, and lower in poorer ones, reflecting the relative nature of national assessments of who is considered poor. In many high-income countries, poverty lines are explicitly relative, set as a share of mean or median income. Despite systematic variation in how countries define poverty, global poverty counts are based on fixed-value lines. To reflect national assessments of poverty in a global headcount of poverty, this paper proposes a societal poverty line. The proposed societal poverty line is derived from 699 harmonized national poverty lines, and has an intercept of $1 per day and a relative gradient of 50 percent of median national income or consumption. The societal poverty line is more closely aligned with national definitions of poverty than other proposed relative lines. By this relative measure, societal poverty has fallen steadily since 1990, but at a much slower pace than absolute extreme poverty.
format	Working Paper
author	Jolliffe, Dean Prydz, Espen Beer
author_facet	Jolliffe, Dean Prydz, Espen Beer
author_sort	Jolliffe, Dean
title	Societal Poverty : A Relative and Relevant Measure
title_short	Societal Poverty : A Relative and Relevant Measure
title_full	Societal Poverty : A Relative and Relevant Measure
title_fullStr	Societal Poverty : A Relative and Relevant Measure
title_full_unstemmed	Societal Poverty : A Relative and Relevant Measure
title_sort	societal poverty : a relative and relevant measure
publisher	World Bank, Washington, DC
publishDate	2017
url	http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/133671495562984832/Societal-poverty-a-relative-and-relevant-measure http://hdl.handle.net/10986/26845
_version_	1764462899889176576

Societal Poverty : A Relative and Relevant Measure

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