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Comment on “Counting the World's Poor,” by Angus Deaton

Comment on “Counting the World's Poor,” by Angus Deaton Comment on “Counting the World’s Poor,” by Angus Deaton Martin Ravallion There is almost never just one way to measure an economic variable, and poverty is no exception. Judgments are required about the best method—given the data avail- able—at virtually every step, starting with the design and processing of the underly- ing household survey data. The judgments made should be explicit and subjected to independent review. In that spirit, Deaton (this issue) provides a usefully critical discussion of the current methods used by the World Bank for measuring poverty. This is welcome and timely. It is welcome in part because it is by Angus Deaton, who for 20 years has been a lead- ing scholar on the theory and methods of welfare measurement using household-level data. And it is timely because of recent concerns about whether our current measure- ment tools fully reflect how the living conditions of the world’s poor are changing. I will not address all the points raised by Deaton—avoiding those on which I think there is broad agreement that the World Bank’s current methods could be improved. These include the way that (invariably troublesome) income surveys are handled, the scope for better use of subjective-qualitative http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png The World Bank Research Observer Oxford University Press

Comment on “Counting the World's Poor,” by Angus Deaton

Ravallion, Martin
The World Bank Research Observer , Volume 16 (2) – Sep 1, 2001
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References (9)

Publisher
Oxford University Press
Copyright
Copyright Oxford University Press 2001
ISSN
0257-3032
eISSN
1564-6971
DOI
10.1093/wbro/16.2.149
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

Comment on “Counting the World’s Poor,” by Angus Deaton Martin Ravallion There is almost never just one way to measure an economic variable, and poverty is no exception. Judgments are required about the best method—given the data avail- able—at virtually every step, starting with the design and processing of the underly- ing household survey data. The judgments made should be explicit and subjected to independent review. In that spirit, Deaton (this issue) provides a usefully critical discussion of the current methods used by the World Bank for measuring poverty. This is welcome and timely. It is welcome in part because it is by Angus Deaton, who for 20 years has been a lead- ing scholar on the theory and methods of welfare measurement using household-level data. And it is timely because of recent concerns about whether our current measure- ment tools fully reflect how the living conditions of the world’s poor are changing. I will not address all the points raised by Deaton—avoiding those on which I think there is broad agreement that the World Bank’s current methods could be improved. These include the way that (invariably troublesome) income surveys are handled, the scope for better use of subjective-qualitative

Journal

The World Bank Research Observer – Oxford University Press

Published: Sep 1, 2001

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