Longitudinal surveys can give insight into economic mobility, which allows us to understand how markers of (dis)advantage are consequential in determining material conditions in the present, and how these markers structure economic opportunity over time. In this paper we show that this dynamic...

This paper explores a novel way to analyse poverty dynamics that are specific to certain measures of multidimensional poverty, such as the "adjusted headcount ratio" proposed by Alkire & Foster (2011a). Assuming there is panel data available, I show that a simultaneous and comprehensive account...

Single parents and unmarried couples are increasingly replacing the traditional nuclear family. This paper investigates if the greater variety in living arrangements contributes to increased resource disparities among children in Germany. Children in single parent families are disadvantaged in...

The purpose of the paper is to identify areas in South Africa where social-economic disparity exists using 2011 census data. Different indices are used to measure spatial disparity with the aim of finding the most appropriate approach for measuring disparities under different circumstances. The...

Relying on the present literature, official statistics, and household survey data in the People's Republic of China, this paper summarizes research findings on the relationship between urbanization, urban-rural inequality, and poverty, and provides further empirical evidence on the role of...

Distributive value judgments based on the 'origins' of economic inequalities (e.g. circumstances and responsible choices) are increasingly evoked to argue that 'the worst form of inequality is to try to make unequal things equal'. However, one may reasonably agree that distributive value...

This paper estimates the number of poor in various countries in Asia by applying an "amalgam poverty line", which is a weighted average of an absolute poverty line (such as $1.25 per day or $1.45 per day) and a reference income (such as the mean or the median income). The number of poor is...

Building on earlier work by political philosophers, economists have recently sought to define a concept of equity that accommodates the fairness of reward to individual responsibility and effort, while allowing for the existence of some inequalities which are unfair and should be compensated....

A recent trend in the study of poverty is to consider a relative poverty line, one that is responsive to the nature of the income distribution. We develop an axiomatic approach to the determination of an amalgam poverty line. Given a reference income (e.g. the mean or the median), the amalgam...

This paper develops a normative approach to the measurement of ex-ante inequality of opportunity in a multidimensional setting - that is, when the individual outcome is represented by a multidimensional variable. We characterize three classes of social welfare functions, all endorsing ex-ante...