IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ags/eeaeje/249791.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Estimating Wealth effects without expenditure Data: Evidence From rural Ethiopia

Author

Listed:
  • Dekker, Marlieen

Abstract

In economic studies, household economic status is usually proxied by measures of consumption or income. In recent years, several studies have advanced an asset-based index as an alternative measure of wealth status. In most studies, the asset-based wealth index is constructed with a standard list of assets comprising household ownership of consumer durables, the characteristics of the household’s dwelling and sometimes household landownership. Although a standard list may be useful when comparing households across countries or urban and rural residents in one country, the assets included may not always be relevant for studies focussing on rural areas or a particular rural area only. This paper addresses the question what assets should be included in the wealth index to the best reflect long-term economic status in rural Ethiopia. We use data from the Ethiopian Rural Household Survey (ERHS) collected in 1994 and 1995 to construct several asset-based wealth indices. We find not all standard assets are relevant locally and signs and heights of factor loadings differ substantially between localities, supporting the case of specified (local) asset listings. The specified asset index performs best compared to other asset indices when considering the distribution of food security across wealth quintiles and is at least as good a predictor of food security as per capita consumption measure for the same households

Suggested Citation

  • Dekker, Marlieen, 2008. "Estimating Wealth effects without expenditure Data: Evidence From rural Ethiopia," Ethiopian Journal of Economics, Ethiopian Economics Association, vol. 15(1), pages 1-85, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:ags:eeaeje:249791
    DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.249791
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/249791/files/marlieen%20Dekker_%20Estimating%20Wealth%20%20effects%20without%20expenditure%20Data.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.22004/ag.econ.249791?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Bigsten, Arne & Kebede, Bereket & Shimeles, Abebe & Taddesse, Mekonnen, 2003. "Growth and Poverty Reduction in Ethiopia: Evidence from Household Panel Surveys," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 31(1), pages 87-106, January.
    2. Deon Filmer & Lant Pritchett, 2001. "Estimating Wealth Effects Without Expenditure Data—Or Tears: An Application To Educational Enrollments In States Of India," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 38(1), pages 115-132, February.
    3. Tarp, Finn & Simler, Kenneth & Matusse, Cristina & Heltberg, Rasmus & Dava, Gabriel, 2002. "The Robustness of Poverty Profiles Reconsidered," Economic Development and Cultural Change, University of Chicago Press, vol. 51(1), pages 77-108, October.
    4. David E. Sahn & David Stifel, 2003. "Exploring Alternative Measures of Welfare in the Absence of Expenditure Data," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 49(4), pages 463-489, December.
    5. Dercon, Stefan, 2004. "Growth and shocks: evidence from rural Ethiopia," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 74(2), pages 309-329, August.
    6. Sahn, David E. & Stifel, David C., 2000. "Poverty Comparisons Over Time and Across Countries in Africa," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 28(12), pages 2123-2155, December.
    7. Angus Deaton & Salman Zaidi, 2002. "Guidelines for Constructing Consumption Aggregates for Welfare Analysis," World Bank Publications, The World Bank, number 14101, April.
    8. Wendy Janssens, 2005. "Measuring Externalities in Program Evaluation," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 05-017/2, Tinbergen Institute, revised 30 Mar 2006.
    9. Deon Filmer & Lant Pritchett, 1999. "The Effect of Household Wealth on Educational Attainment: Evidence from 35 Countries," Population and Development Review, The Population Council, Inc., vol. 25(1), pages 85-120, March.
    10. Magnus Lindelow, 2002. "Sometimes more equal than others: How the choice of welfare indicator can affect the measurement of health inequalities and the incidence of public spending," CSAE Working Paper Series 2002-15, Centre for the Study of African Economies, University of Oxford.
    11. Magnus Lindelow, 2002. "Sometimes More Equal than Others How the choice of welfare indicator can affect the measurement of health inequalities and the incidence of public spending," Economics Series Working Papers WPS/2002-15, University of Oxford, Department of Economics.
    12. Kinsey, Bill & Burger, Kees & Gunning, Jan Willem, 1998. "Coping with drought in Zimbabwe: Survey evidence on responses of rural households to risk," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 26(1), pages 89-110, January.
    13. Moser, Caroline O. N., 1998. "The asset vulnerability framework: Reassessing urban poverty reduction strategies," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 26(1), pages 1-19, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Schreiner, Mark, 2011. "Estimating Expenditure-Based Poverty from the Bangladesh Demographic and Health Survey," Bangladesh Development Studies, Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies (BIDS), vol. 34(4), pages 65-94, December.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Grimm, Michael & Harttgen, Kenneth & Klasen, Stephan & Misselhorn, Mark, 2008. "A Human Development Index by Income Groups," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 36(12), pages 2527-2546, December.
    2. Deon Filmer & Kinnon Scott, 2012. "Assessing Asset Indices," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 49(1), pages 359-392, February.
    3. Vollmer, Frank & Alkire, Sabina, 2022. "Consolidating and improving the assets indicator in the global Multidimensional Poverty Index," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 158(C).
    4. Shaffer, Paul, 2013. "Ten Years of “Q-Squared”: Implications for Understanding and Explaining Poverty," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 269-285.
    5. Damir Esenaliev & Susan Steiner, 2012. "Are Uzbeks Better off than Kyrgyz?: Measuring and Decomposing Horizontal Inequality," Discussion Papers of DIW Berlin 1252, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    6. Patrick Ward, 2014. "Measuring the Level and Inequality of Wealth: An Application to China," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 60(4), pages 613-635, December.
    7. Rodrigo LOVATON DAVILA & Aine Seitz MCCARTHY & Dorothy GONDWE & Phatta KIRDRUAND & Uttan SHARMA, 2022. "Water, Walls, and Bicycles: Wealth Index Composition Using Census Microdata," JODE - Journal of Demographic Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 88(1), pages 79-120, March.
    8. Luisa Natali & Marta Moratti, 2012. "Measuring Household Welfare: Short versus long consumption modules," Papers inwopa671, Innocenti Working Papers.
    9. Eliana Jimenez & Ignacio Correa-Valez & Richard P.C. Brown, 2008. "Wealthy and Healthy in the South Pacific," Discussion Papers Series 378, School of Economics, University of Queensland, Australia.
    10. Jakobsen, Kristian Thor, 2012. "In the Eye of the Storm—The Welfare Impacts of a Hurricane," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 40(12), pages 2578-2589.
    11. Bensch, Gunther & Grimm, Michael & Peter, Katharina & Peters, Jörg & Tasciotti, Luca, 2013. "Impact evaluation of improved stove use in Burkina: FAFASO," RWI Projektberichte, RWI - Leibniz-Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, number 111422, March.
    12. Diana K. L. Ngo & Luc Christiaensen, 2019. "The Performance Of A Consumption Augmented Asset Index In Ranking Households And Identifying The Poor," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 65(4), pages 804-833, December.
    13. Janina Isabel Steinert & Lucie Dale Cluver & G. J. Melendez-Torres & Sebastian Vollmer, 2018. "One Size Fits All? The Validity of a Composite Poverty Index Across Urban and Rural Households in South Africa," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 136(1), pages 51-72, February.
    14. Janz, Teresa & Augsburg, Britta & Gassmann, Franziska & Nimeh, Zina, 2023. "Leaving no one behind: Urban poverty traps in Sub-Saharan Africa," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 172(C).
    15. Carlo Azzarri & Gero Carletto & Benjamin Davis & Alberto Zezza, 2006. "Monitoring Poverty Without Consumption Data : An Application Using the Albania Panel Survey," Eastern European Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 44(1), pages 59-82, February.
    16. Permanyer, Iñaki, 2013. "Using Census Data to Explore the Spatial Distribution of Human Development," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 1-13.
    17. Abderrahman Yassine & Fatima Bakass, 2022. "Do Education and Employment Play a Role in Youth’s Poverty Alleviation? Evidence from Morocco," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(18), pages 1-25, September.
    18. Francisco Azpitarte & Gaston Yalonetzky, 2023. "The measurement of asset and wealth poverty," Chapters, in: Jacques Silber (ed.), Research Handbook on Measuring Poverty and Deprivation, chapter 38, pages 410-419, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    19. Adriana Cardozo & Melanie Grosse, 2009. "Pro-Poor Growth Using Non-Income Indicators: An Empirical Illustration for Colombia," Ibero America Institute for Econ. Research (IAI) Discussion Papers 192, Ibero-America Institute for Economic Research.
    20. Harttgen, Kenneth & Klasen, Stephan, 2012. "A Household-Based Human Development Index," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 40(5), pages 878-899.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ags:eeaeje:249791. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: AgEcon Search (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/eeaa2ea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.