On the Welfarist Rationale for Relative Poverty Lines

Ravallion, Martin

World Bank, Washington, DC

关键词: ABSOLUTE POVERTY;    ABSOLUTE POVERTY LINE;    AGGREGATE POVERTY;    AGRICULTURE;    AVERAGE INCOME;   

DOI  :  10.1596/1813-9450-4486
RP-ID  :  WPS4486

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: World Bank Open Knowledge Repository

【 摘 要 】

The theory and evidence supporting arelativist approach to poverty measurement are criticallyreviewed.Various sources of welfare interdependence areidentified, including the idea of "relativedeprivation" as well other (positive and negative)welfare effects for poor people of belonging to a better-offgroup.An economic model combines informal risk sharingwith the idea of a "positional good," andconditions are derived in which the relative deprivationeffect dominates, implying a relative poverty measure. Thepaper then reviews the problems encountered in testing forwelfare effects of relative deprivation and discusses theimplications of micro evidence from Malawi.The results areconsistent with the emphasis given to absolute level ofliving in development policy discussions.However, relativedeprivation is still evident in the data from this poor butunequal country, and it is likely to become a more importantfactor as the country develops.