IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/tpr/restat/v85y2003i3p645-652.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Measuring Aggregate Welfare in Developing Countries: How Well Do National Accounts and Surveys Agree?

Author

Listed:
  • Martin Ravallion

    (World Bank)

Abstract

In a cross-country data set for developing and transitional economies, private consumption per capita from the national accounts deviates on average from mean household income or expenditure based on national sample surveys. Growth rates also differ systematically, so that the ratio of the survey mean to mean consumption from the national accounts tends to fall over time. The exceptions to these general findings are revealing, however. There are strong regional effects. The aggregate difference in the levels is due more to income surveys than to expenditure surveys. Divergence over time is mainly due to the severe data problems in the (contracting) transition economies. © 2003 President and Fellows of Harvard College and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Suggested Citation

  • Martin Ravallion, 2003. "Measuring Aggregate Welfare in Developing Countries: How Well Do National Accounts and Surveys Agree?," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 85(3), pages 645-652, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:tpr:restat:v:85:y:2003:i:3:p:645-652
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/003465303322369786
    File Function: link to full text
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Ravallion, Martin & Chen, Shaohua, 1997. "What Can New Survey Data Tell Us about Recent Changes in Distribution and Poverty?," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 11(2), pages 357-382, May.
    2. Ulrich Rendtel & Rolf Langeheine & Roland Berntsen, 1998. "The Estimation Of Poverty Dynamics Using Different Measurements Of Household Income," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 44(1), pages 81-98, March.
    3. Harry X. Wu, 2000. "China'S Gdp Level And Growth Performance: Alternative Estimates And The Implications," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 46(4), pages 475-499, December.
    4. Timothy M. Smeeding & Daniel H. Weinberg, 2001. "Toward a Uniform Definition of Household Income," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 47(1), pages 1-24, March.
    5. Adriaan M. Bloem & Paul Cotterell & Terry Gigantes, 1998. "National Accounts In Transition Countries: Balancing The Biases?," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 44(1), pages 1-24, March.
    6. Jack E. Triplett, 1997. "Measuring consumption: the post-1973 slowdown and the research issues," Review, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, issue May, pages 9-42.
    7. repec:bla:revinw:v:32:y:1986:i:3:p:245-76 is not listed on IDEAS
    8. World Bank, 2000. "Global Economic Prospects and the Developing Countries 2000," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 14776.
    9. Margaret Grosh & Paul Glewwe, 2000. "Designing Household Survey Questionnaires for Developing Countries," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 25338.
    10. Martin Ravallion & Shubham Chaudhuri, 1997. "Risk and Insurance in Village India: Comment," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 65(1), pages 171-184, January.
    11. repec:bla:revinw:v:46:y:2000:i:4:p:475-99 is not listed on IDEAS
    12. Slesnick, Daniel T, 1998. "Are Our Data Relevant to the Theory? The Case of Aggregate Consumption Expenditures, and Empirical Consumption and Savings," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 16(1), pages 52-61, January.
    13. Datt, Gaurav & Ravallion, Martin, 1992. "Growth and redistribution components of changes in poverty measures : A decomposition with applications to Brazil and India in the 1980s," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 38(2), pages 275-295, April.
    14. Schmidt-Hebbel, K. & Serven, L., 1997. "Saving Across the World: Puzzles and Policies," World Bank - Discussion Papers 354, World Bank.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Augustin Kwasi Fosu, 2009. "Inequality and the Impact of Growth on Poverty: Comparative Evidence for Sub-Saharan Africa," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 45(5), pages 726-745.
    2. Desire Avom & Fabrizio Carmignani & Abdour Chowdhury, "undated". "Four Scenarios of Poverty Reduction and the Role of Economic Policy," MRG Discussion Paper Series 3109, School of Economics, University of Queensland, Australia.
    3. Montalvo, Jose G. & Ravallion, Martin, 2010. "The pattern of growth and poverty reduction in China," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 38(1), pages 2-16, March.
    4. Kalwij, Adriaan & Verschoor, Arjan, 2007. "Not by growth alone: The role of the distribution of income in regional diversity in poverty reduction," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 51(4), pages 805-829, May.
    5. Sotomayor, Orlando, 2004. "Development and Income Distribution: The Case of Puerto Rico," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 32(8), pages 1395-1406, August.
    6. 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.
    7. Marta Castilho & Marta Menéndez & Aude A. Sztulman, 2015. "Poverty and Inequality Dynamics in Manaus: Legacy of a Free Trade Zone?," Working Papers halshs-01245394, HAL.
    8. Bui, Tuan & Nguyen, Cuong & Pham, Phuong, 2015. "Poverty among ethnic minorities: transition process, inequality and economic growth," MPRA Paper 68924, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    9. Adriaan Kalwij & Arjan Verschoor, 2005. "A Decomposition of Poverty Trends Across Regions: the Role of Variation in the Income and Inequality Elasticities of Poverty," WIDER Working Paper Series RP2005-36, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    10. Bluhm R & Crombrugghe D.P.I. de & Szirmai A., 2013. "The pace of poverty reduction - A fractional response approach," MERIT Working Papers 2013-051, United Nations University - Maastricht Economic and Social Research Institute on Innovation and Technology (MERIT).
    11. Sara Lelli, 2004. "What Money Can't Buy: The Relevance of Income Redistribution for Functioning Levels," WIDER Working Paper Series RP2004-41, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    12. Kanbur, Ravi & Lustig, Nora, 1999. "Why is Inequality Back on the Agenda?," Working Papers 127690, Cornell University, Department of Applied Economics and Management.
    13. Ravallion, Martin, 1997. "Can high-inequality developing countries escape absolute poverty?," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 56(1), pages 51-57, September.
    14. Vincenzo Lombardo, 2011. "Growth and Inequality Effects on Poverty Reduction in Italy," Rivista italiana degli economisti, Società editrice il Mulino, issue 2, pages 241-280.
    15. Bluhm, Richard & de Crombrugghe, Denis & Szirmai, Adam, 2018. "Poverty accounting," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 237-255.
    16. Ngepah, Nicholas & Espoir, Delphin Kamanda, 2018. "Binding constraints of economic growth on poverty: A dynamic panel data analysis," MPRA Paper 92136, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 15 Oct 2018.
    17. Daniele Malerba, 2018. "How to reduce poverty and address climate change? An empirical cross-country analysis and the roles of economic growth and inequality," Global Development Institute Working Paper Series 322018, GDI, The University of Manchester.
    18. Sawada, Yasuyuki & Nakata, Hiroyuki & Kotera, Tomoaki, 2017. "Self-Production, Friction, and Risk Sharing against Disasters: Evidence from a Developing Country," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 94(C), pages 27-37.
    19. Meng, Xin & Gregory, Robert & Wang, Youjuan, 2005. "Poverty, inequality, and growth in urban China, 1986-2000," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 33(4), pages 710-729, December.
    20. Antonella Biscione & Dorothée Boccanfuso & Raul Caruso, 2020. "A Hypothesis on Poverty Change in Albania (2007-2016)," Rivista Internazionale di Scienze Sociali, Vita e Pensiero, Pubblicazioni dell'Universita' Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, vol. 128(3), pages 301-320.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:tpr:restat:v:85:y:2003:i:3:p:645-652. 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: The MIT Press (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://direct.mit.edu/journals .

    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.