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Assessing poverty. Some reflections on the literature

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Abstract

This paper examines the quantitative poverty measurement literature. After describing the literature a number of issues in poverty research are discussed. It can be concluded that the framework for poverty assessments is not always fixed. Much has been written about the poverty line but the issue of updating it seems to have attracted less attention than deserved. Substantial advancements in poverty research have been gained by fuller reports on the extent of poverty through the use of poverty indices and because of increased availability of panel data.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Social Work, University of Göteborg, Sprängkullsgatan 23, S-41123, Göteborg, Sweden

    Björn Gustafsson

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  1. Björn Gustafsson
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Revised version of an invited lecture presented at the Eighth Annual Conference of the European Society for Population Economics, Tilburg, The Netherlands, 1994. 1 thank three referees for useful suggestions, Ludmila Nivorozhkina for supplying information on the development of poverty in Russia and Håkan Nyman for producing the figures. The content draws on research conducted with financial support from the Swedish Council of Social Research (SFR).

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Gustafsson, B. Assessing poverty. Some reflections on the literature. J Popul Econ 8, 361–381 (1995). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00180874

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