A Unifi ed Approach to Measuring Poverty and Inequality

[...]... convex, and the general mean emphasizes higher incomes 7 A Uni ed Approach to Measuring Poverty and Inequality As a varies across all possible values, the general mean rises from minimum income (as a approaches −∞), to the harmonic mean (a = −1), the geometric mean (a = 0), the mean (a = 1), the Euclidean mean (a = 2), up to the maximum income (as a approaches ∞) General means with a < 0 are only defined... including a measure of inequality among the poor within the measure of poverty Thus, to measure and to understand the many dimensions of income poverty, one must have a clear understanding of income standards and inequality measures This chapter is a conceptual introduction to poverty measurement and the related distributional analysis tools It begins with a brief discussion of the variable and data to be... social protection and labor systems that safeguard poor and vulnerable people against severe shocks and crises RSR has been generously supported by Australia, Norway, the Russian Federation, Sweden, and the United Kingdom James Foster is grateful to the Elliott School of International Affairs and Dean Michael Brown for facilitating research on global poverty and international development The Ultra -poverty. .. measure actually gauges The first way is through the properties it satisfies The second makes use of a fundamental link between inequality measures and income standards We begin with the first approach 13 A Uni ed Approach to Measuring Poverty and Inequality There are four basic properties for inequality measures: • The first two are symmetry and population invariance properties, which are analogous to. .. standard and b the upperincome standard, overall inequality is I = (b − a) /b, or some other increasing function of the ratio b /a Common Examples Virtually all inequality measures in common use are based on twin income standards This is easily seen in the case of the 90/10 ratio, and generalizes to any quantile ratio b /a, where a corresponds to the income at a percentile p of 15 A Uni ed Approach to Measuring. .. on poverty, inequality, and labor The software automates the analysis, helps minimize human error, and encourages development of new methods of economic analysis For each run, ADePT produces one output file—containing your selection of tables and graphs, an optional original data summary, and errors and notifications—in Microsoft Excel® format Tables of standard errors and frequencies can be added to. .. unified approach provides advantages in interpreting and contrasting the measures and in understanding the way measures vary over time and space Second, the theoretical presentation is complemented by empirical examples that ground the discussion, and it provides a practical guide to the inequality and poverty modules of the ADePT software developed at the World Bank By immediately applying the measurement... seen to be higher The final example is the family of generalized entropy measures, whose definition and properties vary with a parameter a There are three distinct ranges for the parameter: a lower range where a < 1, an upper range where a > 1, and a limiting case where a = 1 When a < 1, the generalized entropy measures evaluate inequality in the same way as the Atkinson class of inequality measures (and, ... consumption 3 Aggregate the data into an overall poverty measure Headcount ratio is the most basic measure It simply calculates the share of the population that is poor But following the work of Amartya Sen, other aggregation methods designed to evaluate the depth and severity of poverty have become part of the poverty analyst’s standard toolkit.1 Applying and interpreting poverty measures require understanding... user’s guide for readers wanting to analyze income or consumption distribution for any standard household dataset using the ADePT program a free download from the World Bank’s website In the prosaic world of official publications, A Unified Approach to Measuring Poverty and Inequality: Theory and Practice is sure to stand out It is written with a flair and fluency that is rare For readers with little . class="bi x0 y0 w0 h0" alt="" A Unifi ed Approach to Measuring Poverty and Inequality Health Equity and Financial Protection: Streamlined Analysis with ADePT Software (2011) by Adam Wagstaff,. conditions: Attribution—Please cite the work as follows: Foster, James, Suman Seth, Michael Lokshin, and Zurab Sajaia. 2013. A Unified Approach to Measuring Poverty and Inequality: Theory and Practice of official publications, A Unified Approach to Measuring Poverty and Inequality: Theory and Practice is sure to stand out. It is written with a flair and fluency that is rare. For readers with