This paper extends the previous literature on the normative links between the measurement of poverty, social welfare and inequality. We show how, when the range of possible poverty lines is unbounded above, a robust ranking of absolute poverty may be interpreted as a robust ranking of social...

This paper proposes some changes to the official methodology that is currently in use to measure the state of poverty in Mexico. Among other suggestions, it is recommended the use of bootstrapping to estimate confidence intervals for the poverty statistics, as well as the use of dominance...

The relatively widespread use of poverty measures is analysed and their properties compared with other definitions of welfare. Using a synthetic data set but one which shares some properties of the Irish income distribution of 1987, a number of changes in incomes are simulated and their impact...

When evaluating poverty, the relative poverty line may be considered as a percentage of the median income or it may be a percentage of the average income. It is proved that, with a poverty line relative to the median income, reducing poverty may become less costly in proportion to the total...

The theoretical literature on pro-poor growth as well as its applications have not paid sufficient attention to the issue of varying inflation rates across the income distribution. Ignoring inflation inequality in pro-poor growth measurements can however severely bias assessments of pro-poor...

This study is based on primary data collected from randomly chosen 182 households inhabiting seven sample villages in the Udalguri subdivision, Assam (india). It indicates that at least 35.85 percent of the population (and 33.52 percent of households) in the sample villages is below poverty line...

This paper investigates the influence of invariance axioms in the decomposition of observed poverty variations into growth and inequality effects. After a complete and critical review of the invariance axioms suggested in the literature, we show that few information is needed for the ordering of...

(english) This paper introduces a new methodology to target direct transfers against poverty. Our method is based on estimation methods that focus on the poor. Using data from Tunisia, we estimate ‘focused’ transfer schemes that highly improve anti-poverty targeting performances....

This paper introduces a new methodology to target direct transfers against poverty. Our method is based on estimation methods that focus on the poor. Using data from Tunisia, we estimate ‘focused’ transfer schemes that highly improve anti-poverty targeting performances. Post-transfer poverty...

This paper documents the impact of Argentina's recent economic crises on different aspects of poverty, with a special focus on the economic collapse of 2002. We discuss the methodology of poverty measurement in Argentina and we use a simple rule to compensate for the lack of regional poverty...