Are the world’s poorest being left behind?

No 369, Working Papers from ECINEQ, Society for the Study of Economic Inequality

Abstract: Traditional assessments of economic growth and progress against poverty put little or no weight on increasing the standard of living of the poorest—raising the floor for permanent consumption above the biological minimum. Yet raising the floor is often emphasized by policy makers, moral philosophers and social choice theorists. To address this deficiency, the paper defines and measures the expected value of the floor as a weighted mean of observed consumptions for the poorest stratum. Using data for the developing world over 1981-2011, the estimated floor is about half the \$1.25 a day poverty line. Economic growth and social policies have delivered only modest progress in raising the floor, despite progress in reducing the number living near the floor.

Keywords: Poverty; consumption floor; Rawls; growth; safety-nets. (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I32 I38 O15 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 40 pages
Date: 2015-07
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-dev, nep-ger and nep-ltv
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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Related works:
Journal Article: Are the world’s poorest being left behind? (2016)
Working Paper: Are the World’s Poorest Being Left Behind? (2014)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:inq:inqwps:ecineq2015-369

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