IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/got/iaidps/176.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Determinants of the Growth Semi-Elasticity of Poverty Reduction

Author

Listed:

Abstract

In this paper we examine the mathematical relationship between growth and distributional change on absolute (i.e. percentage point) changes in FGT poverty measures assuming a log-normal income distribution, which we argue to be a conceptually superior and more policy-relevant measure than the much used ’regular’ growth elasticity of poverty reduction. We also test the empirical relationship of these semi-elasticities of growth and distributional change on poverty and find them to explain actual changes in poverty very well (in fact, much better than a related study by Bourguignon (2003) that studied the growth elasticity of poverty reduction). This is particularly the case when poverty depth and severity is considered. Using our results helps in interpreting past performance in poverty reduction and will allow a rapid and quite reliable prediction of the impact of growth and distributional change on (absolute) poverty reduction across countries, taking heterogeneity in country circumstances into account.

Suggested Citation

  • Stephan Klasen & Mark Misselhorn, 2008. "Determinants of the Growth Semi-Elasticity of Poverty Reduction," Ibero America Institute for Econ. Research (IAI) Discussion Papers 176, Ibero-America Institute for Economic Research.
    • Handle: RePEc:got:iaidps:176
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www2.vwl.wiso.uni-goettingen.de/ibero/working_paper_neu/DB176.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    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. Florent BRESSON, 2006. "Poverty: Looking for the Real Elasticities," Working Papers 200618, CERDI.
    3. Ravallion, Martin & Huppi, Monika, 1991. "Measuring Changes in Poverty: A Methodological Case Study of Indonesia during an Adjustment Period," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 5(1), pages 57-82, January.
    4. Kraay, Aart, 2006. "When is growth pro-poor? Evidence from a panel of countries," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 80(1), pages 198-227, June.
    5. repec:bla:revinw:v:39:y:1993:i:2:p:121-39 is not listed on IDEAS
    6. Ravallion, Martin & Chen, Shaohua, 2007. "China's (uneven) progress against poverty," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 82(1), pages 1-42, January.
    7. Rati Ram, 2006. "Growth Elasticity of Poverty: Alternative Estimates and a Note of Caution," Kyklos, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 59(4), pages 601-610, November.
    8. Nanak Kakwani, 1993. "Poverty And Economic Growth With Application To Côte D'Ivoire," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 39(2), pages 121-139, June.
    9. 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.
    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. Kalwij, A.S. & Verschoor, A., 2004. "How Good is Growth for the Poor? The Role of Initial Income Distribution in Regional Diversity in Poverty Trends," Other publications TiSEM 199ed5a4-ad69-4cf9-81d7-b, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    2. Azevedo, Joao Pedro & Inchauste, Gabriela & Olivieri, Sergio & Saavedra, Jaime & Winkler, Hernan, 2013. "Is labor income responsible for poverty reduction ? a decomposition approach," Policy Research Working Paper Series 6414, The World Bank.
    3. Ferreira, Francisco H.G. & Ravallion, Martin, 2008. "Global poverty and inequality : a review of the evidence," Policy Research Working Paper Series 4623, The World Bank.
    4. Facundo Alvaredo & Leonardo Gasparini, 2013. "Recent Trends in Inequality and Poverty in Developing Countries," CEDLAS, Working Papers 0151, CEDLAS, Universidad Nacional de La Plata.
    5. Ferreira, Francisco H.G. & Leite, Phillippe G. & Ravallion, Martin, 2010. "Poverty reduction without economic growth?: Explaining Brazil's poverty dynamics, 1985-2004," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 93(1), pages 20-36, September.
    6. 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.
    7. Ravallion, Martin, 2005. "Inequality is bad for the poor," Policy Research Working Paper Series 3677, The World Bank.
    8. Martin Ravallion, 2005. "A poverty-inequality trade off?," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 3(2), pages 169-181, August.
    9. Azevedo, Joao Pedro & Inchauste, Gabriela & Sanfelice, Viviane, 2013. "Decomposing the recent inequality decline in Latin America," Policy Research Working Paper Series 6715, The World Bank.
    10. 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.
    11. 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.
    12. 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.
    13. Sujin Choi & Hanho Kim, 2016. "The impact of conglomerate farming on the poor: Empirical evidence from the Brazil soy sector," International Area Studies Review, Center for International Area Studies, Hankuk University of Foreign Studies, vol. 19(2), pages 147-164, June.
    14. Fosu, Augustin Kwasi, 2017. "Growth, inequality, and poverty reduction in developing countries: Recent global evidence," Research in Economics, Elsevier, vol. 71(2), pages 306-336.
    15. Appleton, Simon & Song, Lina & Xia, Qingjie, 2010. "Growing out of Poverty: Trends and Patterns of Urban Poverty in China 1988-2002," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 38(5), pages 665-678, May.
    16. 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).
    17. 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).
    18. Edgar J. Wilson & Kankesu Jayanthakumaran & Reetu Verma, 2022. "Urban poverty, growth, and inequality: A needed paradigm shift?," Review of Development Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 26(2), pages 941-961, May.
    19. Iniguez-Montiel, Alberto Javier, 2014. "Growth with Equity for the Development of Mexico: Poverty, Inequality, and Economic Growth (1992–2008)," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 59(C), pages 313-326.
    20. 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.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Poverty reduction; growth elasticity; growth semi-elasticity; income distribution;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • O1 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development
    • I32 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - Measurement and Analysis of Poverty
    • O2 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Development Planning and Policy

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:got:iaidps:176. 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: Sabine Jaep (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/ibgoede.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.