IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/sek/iacpro/9010710.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

A critique of the conceptualization of child poverty

Author

Listed:
  • HANNAH DUNGA

    (VAAL UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY)

Abstract

Poverty measures have evolved over the years from the income-based poverty threshold to those that take into account non-income aspects of a person?s wellbeing, the popular one being the multidimensional poverty measure. In all these measures children have been taken for granted in terms of the unique nature and the multifaceted deprivations that may be associated with children and not adults. The employment of equivalence scales makes assumptions that go to the extent of looking at children in different contexts and households as being homogenous. A proper measure that takes into account individual idiosyncrasies may not be easy but the current measures that are being applied are to a greater extent underestimating the level of child poverty globally and specifically in developing countries. This paper is motivated by the understanding that there could be more poor children than we care but we are not able to count based on the existing measures of poverty. This paper presents a critique of the child poverty measures that exist and points out the fact that there is need to develop a dedicated and succinct measure of child poverty beyond the equivalence scales that relate child poverty to the household income poverty line.

Suggested Citation

  • Hannah Dunga, 2019. "A critique of the conceptualization of child poverty," Proceedings of International Academic Conferences 9010710, International Institute of Social and Economic Sciences.
    • Handle: RePEc:sek:iacpro:9010710
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://iises.net/proceedings/iises-international-academic-conference-london/table-of-content/detail?cid=90&iid=013&rid=10710
    File Function: First version, 2019
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Sabina Alkire & Bouba Housseini, 2014. "Multidimensional Poverty in Sub-Saharan Africa: Levels and Trends," OPHI Working Papers 81, Queen Elizabeth House, University of Oxford.
    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. Mathias KUEPIE & Eric Patrick FEUBI PAMEN, 2017. "An Application of the Alkire-Foster’s Multidimensional Poverty Index to Data from Madagascar: Taking Into Account the Dimensions of Employment and Gender Inequality," Working Paper 6ca04615-044d-41a0-8737-9, Agence française de développement.
    2. Tabish Nawab & Saqlain Raza & Malik Shahzad Shabbir & Ghulam Yahya Khan & Sana Bashir, 2023. "Multidimensional poverty index across districts in Punjab, Pakistan: estimation and rationale to consolidate with SDGs," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 25(2), pages 1301-1325, February.
    3. Arndt, Channing & Mahrt, Kristi & Hussain, M. Azhar & Tarp, Finn, 2018. "A human rights-consistent approach to multidimensional welfare measurement applied to sub-Saharan Africa," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 108(C), pages 181-196.
    4. Arndt, Channing & Mahrt, Kristi & Hussain, M. Azhar & Tarp, Finn, 2018. "A human rights-consistent approach to multidimensional welfare measurement applied to sub-Saharan Africa," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 108(C), pages 181-196.
    5. Muna Shifa & Murray Leibbrandt, 2017. "Profiling Multidimensional Poverty and Inequality in Kenya and Zambia at Sub-National Levels," SALDRU Working Papers 209, Southern Africa Labour and Development Research Unit, University of Cape Town.
    6. Eva-Maria Egger & Vincenzo Salvucci & Finn Tarp, 2023. "Evolution of Multidimensional Poverty in Crisis-Ridden Mozambique," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 166(3), pages 485-519, April.
    7. Gbetoton Nadege Djossou & Gilles Quentin Kane & Jacob Novignon, 2017. "Is Growth Pro‐Poor in Benin? Evidence Using a Multidimensional Measure of Poverty," Poverty & Public Policy, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 9(4), pages 426-443, December.
    8. Hänke, Hendrik & Barkmann, Jan & Blum, Lloyd & Franke, Yvonne & Martin, Dominic A. & Niens, Jasnna & Osen, Kristina & Uruena, Viviana & Witherspoon, S. Annette & Wurz, Annemarie, 2018. "Socio-economic, land use and value chain perspectives on vanilla farming in the SAVA Region (north-eastern Madagascar): The Diversity Turn Baseline Study (DTBS)," DARE Discussion Papers 1806, Georg-August University of Göttingen, Department of Agricultural Economics and Rural Development (DARE).
    9. Vibeke Bjornlund & Henning Bjornlund & André Rooyen, 2022. "Why food insecurity persists in sub-Saharan Africa: A review of existing evidence," Food Security: The Science, Sociology and Economics of Food Production and Access to Food, Springer;The International Society for Plant Pathology, vol. 14(4), pages 845-864, August.
    10. Steven Henry Dunga, 2019. "Housing insecurity measure, a development of a validated scale using household data," Proceedings of International Academic Conferences 9010627, International Institute of Social and Economic Sciences.
    11. Jessica Noromalala Andriamparany & Hendrik Hänke & Eva Schlecht, 2021. "Food security and food quality among vanilla farmers in Madagascar: the role of contract farming and livestock keeping," Food Security: The Science, Sociology and Economics of Food Production and Access to Food, Springer;The International Society for Plant Pathology, vol. 13(4), pages 981-1012, August.
    12. Shinkai, Naoko, 2016. "Examination of Poverty in Northern Mozambique: A Comparison of Social and Economic Dimensions," Working Papers 133, JICA Research Institute.
    13. Zaman, Qamar uz & Zhao, Yuhuan & Zaman, Shah & Alenezi, Marim & Jehan, Noor, 2023. "Spatial evaluation of multidimensional energy poverty between farming and non-farming communities of agro-climatic zones of Pakistan," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 172(C).
    14. Sebastián Burgos Dávila & Fernando Cando Ortega, 2016. "Multidimensional poverty: an index for Ecuador using Alkire and Foster methodology," Economía, Instituto de Investigaciones Económicas y Sociales (IIES). Facultad de Ciencias Económicas y Sociales. Universidad de Los Andes. Mérida, Venezuela, vol. 41(42), pages 11-52, july-dece.
    15. Lukas Salecker & Anar K. Ahmadov & Leyla Karimli, 2020. "Contrasting Monetary and Multidimensional Poverty Measures in a Low-Income Sub-Saharan African Country," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 151(2), pages 547-574, September.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    child poverty; measures; scale; household;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I32 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - Measurement and Analysis of Poverty

    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:sek:iacpro:9010710. 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: Klara Cermakova (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://iises.net/ .

    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.