Accounting for Heterogeneity in Growth Incidence in Cameroon

Essama-Nssah, B. ; Bassole, Leandre ; Paul, Saumik

关键词: ADVERSE EFFECTS;    AGGREGATE POVERTY;    AGRICULTURAL EMPLOYMENT;    AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTS;    AGRICULTURAL SECTOR;   

DOI  :  10.1596/1813-9450-5464
RP-ID  :  WPS5464

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: World Bank Open Knowledge Repository

【 摘 要 】

This paper presents counterfactualdecompositions based on both the Shapley method and ageneralization of the Oaxaca-Blinder approach to identifyproximate factors that might explain differences in thedistribution of economic welfare in Cameroon in 1996-2007.In particular, the analysis uses re-centered influencefunction regressions to link the growth incidence curve for2001-2007 to household characteristics and account forheterogeneity of impact across quantiles in terms of thecomposition (or endowment) effect and structural (or price)effect. The analysis finds that the level of the growthincidence curve is explained by the endowment effect whileits shape is driven by the price effect. Observed gains atthe bottom of the distribution are due to returns toendowments. The rest of the gains are accounted for by thecomposition effect. Further decomposition of these effectsshows that the composition effect is determined mainly byhousehold demographics while the structural effect is shapedby the sector of employment and geography. Finally, analysisof the rural-urban gap in living standards shows that, forthe poorest households in both sectors, differences inhousehold characteristics matter more than the returns tothose characteristics. The opposite is true for better-off households.