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Poverty Among Elderly in India

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  • Akanksha Srivastava
  • Sanjay Mohanty

Abstract

Using consumption expenditure data of the National Sample Survey 2004–2005, this paper estimates the size of elderly poor and tests the hypotheses that elderly households are not economically better-off compared to non-elderly households in India. Poverty estimates are derived under three scenarios—by applying the official cut-off point of the poverty line to household consumption expenditure (unadjusted), consumption expenditure adjusted to household size and consumption expenditure adjusted to household composition. Results show that an estimated 18 million elderly in India are living below the poverty line. On adjusting the consumption expenditure to household size and composition, there are no significant differences in the incidence of poverty among elderly and non-elderly households in India. This is in contrast to the notion that elderly households are better off than non-elderly households in India. Based on the findings, we suggest that the age dimension should be integrated into social policies for evidence based planning. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2012

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  • Akanksha Srivastava & Sanjay Mohanty, 2012. "Poverty Among Elderly in India," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 109(3), pages 493-514, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:soinre:v:109:y:2012:i:3:p:493-514
    DOI: 10.1007/s11205-011-9913-7
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    2. Anand, Mukesh Kumar & Chakraborty, Rahul, 2019. "Public Expenditure on Old-Age Income Support in India: Largesse for a Few, Illusory for Most," Working Papers 19/253, National Institute of Public Finance and Policy.
    3. Precious Mncayi & Steven Henry Dunga, 2019. "Analysis of poverty among the elderly in South Africa using the 2018 GHS data," Proceedings of International Academic Conferences 9912239, International Institute of Social and Economic Sciences.
    4. Rajasekhar, D. & Kesavan, Santosh & Manjula, R., 2016. "Contributory pension schemes for the poor: Issues and ways forward," Working Papers 377, Institute for Social and Economic Change, Bangalore.
    5. Sanjay Mohanty & Rajesh Chauhan & Sumit Mazumdar & Akanksha Srivastava, 2014. "Out-of-pocket Expenditure on Health Care Among Elderly and Non-elderly Households in India," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 115(3), pages 1137-1157, February.
    6. Pushpendra Singh & Virendra Kumar, 2017. "The Rising Burden of Healthcare Expenditure in India: A Poverty Nexus," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 133(2), pages 741-762, September.
    7. Visaria, Abhijit & Dommaraju, Premchand, 2019. "Productive aging in India," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 229(C), pages 14-21.
    8. Satish Kumar & Filomena Maggino & Raj V. Mahto & Riya Sureka & Leonardo Salvatore Alaimo & Weng Marc Lim, 2022. "Social Indicators Research: A Retrospective Using Bibliometric Analysis," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 162(1), pages 413-448, July.

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