The Measurement of Household Welfare

The Measurement of Household Welfare
Author: R. W. Blundell
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 295
Release: 1994-09-15
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0521451957

The measurement of household welfare is one of the most compelling yet demanding areas in economics. To place the analysis of inequality and poverty within an economic framework where individuals are making decisions about current and lifetime incomes and expenditures is a difficult task, made all the more challenging by the complexity of the decision-making process in which households are involved and the variety of constraints they face. This 1994 book examines the conceptual and practical difficulties of making inferences from observed behaviour. It addresses the problems of making comparisons across a range of very different households and discusses how data for such comparisons should be collected. The contributions, from experts from Europe, North America and Australia, have the unifying theme that there is a strong relationship between theoretical concepts from microeconomics and the appropriate use of micro data in evaluating household welfare.

Measuring Economic Welfare: What and How?

Measuring Economic Welfare: What and How?
Author: Mr.Marshall B Reinsdorf
Publisher: International Monetary Fund
Total Pages: 49
Release: 2020-05-18
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1513544586

Calls for a more people-focused approach to statistics on economic performance, and concerns about inequality, environmental impacts, and effects of digitalization have put welfare at the top of the measurement agenda. This paper argues that economic welfare is a narrower concept than well-being. The new focus implies a need to prioritize filling data gaps involving the economic welfare indicators of the System of National Accounts 2008 (SNA) and improving their quality, including the quality of the consumption price indexes. Development of distributional indicators of income, consumption, and wealth should also be a priority. Definitions and assumptions can have big effects on these indicators and should be documented. Concerns have also arisen over potentially overlooked welfare growth from the emergence of the digital economy. However, the concern that free online platforms are missing from nominal GDP is incorrect. Also, many of the welfare effects of digitalization require complementary indicators, either because they are conceptually outside the boundary of GDP or impossible to quantify without making uncertain assumptions.

For Good Measure

For Good Measure
Author: Joseph E. Stiglitz
Publisher: The New Press
Total Pages: 450
Release: 2019-11-19
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1620975726

Today's leading economists weigh in with a new "dashboard" of metrics for measuring our economic and social health "What we measure affects what we do. If we focus only on material well-being—on, say, the production of goods, rather than on health, education, and the environment—we become distorted in the same way that these measures are distorted." —Joseph E. Stiglitz A consensus has emerged among key experts that our conventional economic measures are out of sync with how most people live their lives. GDP, they argue, is a poor and outmoded measure of our well-being. The global movement to move beyond GDP has attracted some of the world's leading economists, statisticians, and social thinkers who have worked collectively to articulate new approaches to measuring economic well-being and social progress. In the decade since the 2008 economic crisis, these experts have come together to determine what indicators can actually tell us about people's lives. In the first book of its kind, leading economists from around the world, including Thomas Piketty, Emmanuel Saez, Elizabeth Beasely, Jacob Hacker, François Bourguignon, Nora Lustig, Alan B. Krueger, and Joseph E. Stiglitz, describe a range of fascinating metrics—from economic insecurity and environmental sustainability to inequality of opportunity and levels of trust and resilience—that can be used to supplement the simplistic measure of gross domestic product, providing a far more nuanced and accurate account of societal health and well-being. This groundbreaking volume is sure to provide a major source of ideas and inspiration for one of the most important intellectual movements of our time.

The Analysis of Household Surveys

The Analysis of Household Surveys
Author: Angus Deaton
Publisher: World Bank Publications
Total Pages: 492
Release: 1997
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9780801852541

Using data from several countries, including Cote d'Ivoire, India, Pakistan, Taiwan, and Thailand, this book analyzes household survey data from developing countries and illustrates how such data can be used to cast light on a range of short-term and long-term policy issues.

Guidelines for Constructing Consumption Aggregates for Welfare Analysis

Guidelines for Constructing Consumption Aggregates for Welfare Analysis
Author: Angus Deaton
Publisher: World Bank Publications
Total Pages: 128
Release: 2002-01-01
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9780821349908

In September 2001, staff from the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund met with the objective of strengthening collaboration between the two organizations in projects of civil service reform. This strengthened collaboration will have key benefits in ensuring consistency between the conflicting goals of the two organizations, establishing realistic objectives within the reform process, and maintaining a core set of wage and employment data. The principal conclusion arrived at was that World Bank and IMF staff should be engaging in collaboration earlier in the reform process. To guide the collaboration, six foundations were identified. These include: develop a medium-term fiscal framework; foster national ownership by making reforms politically feasible; focus and streamline conditionality; agree on sequencing and timing of reforms; and strengthen data collection. These principals will be tested for effectiveness in several focus countries.

Investigating the Determinants of Household Welfare in Cote D'Ivoire

Investigating the Determinants of Household Welfare in Cote D'Ivoire
Author: Paul Glewwe
Publisher:
Total Pages: 68
Release: 1990
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN:

To predict the effect of economic policies on household welfare, one should first understand which characteristics of households and of the localities in which they live, enable them to raise their welfare levels. This paper outlines a simple procedure for investigating the determinants of household welfare and demonstrates its use with recent data from Cote d'Ivoire. Despite the relative simplicity, much information is obtained from its use on cross-sectional survey data. Results specific to Cote d'Ivoire include : high (low) returns to education in urban (rural) areas; high benefits from cocoa land relative to coffee land; a significant impact on economic welfare from the availability of medical services, and no apparent benefits from agricultural extension services.

Choice, Welfare and Measurement

Choice, Welfare and Measurement
Author: Amartya Sen
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 480
Release: 1997
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9780674127784

"Choice, Welfare and Measurement contains many of Amartya Sen's most important contributions to economic analysis and methods, including papers on individual and social choice, preference and rationality, and aggregation and economic measurement. A substantial introductory essay interrelates his diverse concerns, and also analyzes discussions generated by the original papers, focusing on the underlying issues."--P. [4] of cover.

The Design and Use of Political Economy Indicators

The Design and Use of Political Economy Indicators
Author: K. Banaian
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 226
Release: 2008-11-10
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0230616623

This edited volume seeks to provide a critical and technical look at international political economic indices (PEIs). It examines measurement issues, relates PEIs to economic theory, and suggests better measures than those currently used.

Measuring Poverty and Wellbeing in Developing Countries

Measuring Poverty and Wellbeing in Developing Countries
Author: Channing Arndt
Publisher: OUP Oxford
Total Pages: 372
Release: 2016-12-15
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0198744803

This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO licence. It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations. Detailed analyses of poverty and wellbeing in developing countries, based on household surveys, have been ongoing for more than three decades. The large majority of developing countries now regularly conduct a variety of household surveys, and the information base in developing countries with respect to poverty and wellbeing has improved dramatically. Nevertheless, appropriate measurement of poverty remains complex and controversial. This is particularly true in developing countries where (i) the stakes with respect to poverty reduction are high; (ii) the determinants of living standards are often volatile; and (iii) related information bases, while much improved, are often characterized by significant non-sample error. It also remains, to a surprisingly high degree, an activity undertaken by technical assistance personnel and consultants based in developed countries. This book seeks to enhance the transparency, replicability, and comparability of existing practice. In so doing, it also aims to significantly lower the barriers to entry to the conduct of rigorous poverty measurement and increase the participation of analysts from developing countries in their own poverty assessments. The book focuses on two domains: the measurement of absolute consumption poverty and a first order dominance approach to multidimensional welfare analysis. In each domain, it provides a series of flexible computer codes designed to facilitate analysis by allowing the analyst to start from a flexible and known base. The book volume covers the theoretical grounding for the code streams provided, a chapter on 'estimation in practice', a series of 11 case studies where the code streams are operationalized, as well as a synthesis, an extension to inequality, and a look forward.