Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Human Capital, Employment And Subjective-Objective Poverty: A Micro Case Study Of Nepal, Tejesh Pradhan

Masters Theses

This thesis derives an alternative subjective-objective poverty line (SPL) using self-reported qualitative assessments of perceived adequacy for different categories of consumption namely, food, housing and clothing. Modeling the probability of reporting that actual consumption in each category is adequate, I find that actual measures of consumption are highly significant predictors of perceived consumption adequacy. The perceived adequacy for different consumption components respond more elastically to spending on the corresponding category of goods than to that on other types. The results suggest that the implied subjective poverty lines and regional profiles are different from those predicted by popular objective methods.

This …

Poverty Within Nation-States: The Impact Of Corruption, Trade, Income Inequality, Population Growth, Foreign Aid, And Military Expenditure, Mustafa Karapinar

Graduate Program in International Studies Theses & Dissertations

Theoretical approaches to development have marginalized poverty and the individual from the developmental debates. Instead, these approaches place the state as the conventional unit of development and tended to address poverty at the societal level. In these respects, these approaches have neglected how development affects poverty at the individual level.

This study criticizes one of these approaches, the modernization theory of Development, and analyzes the relationship between poverty and some economic, political, and social factors. These factors include openness to trade, foreign aid, military expenditure, income inequality, corruption, and population. There have been several studies examining the relationship between poverty …

A New Approach To Measuring Poverty In The United States: A Household's Ability To Consume, David Ashelman

Applied Economics Theses

The definition of poverty is a social construct. As such, quantitatively measuring poverty is problematic, and creates ineffective poverty-alleviation policy. This thesis examines the historical measure of poverty in the United States, compares U.S. poverty measurements to Great Britain and Canada, and then proposes a new way to measure poverty. Instead of measuring income as the defining factor of poverty, the new poverty measurement suggested eliminates income factors and focuses on a household’s ability to consume in a non-comparative manner. When quantifying a household’s ability to consume, implications arise in economic policy for anti-poverty programs, defining the middle class, minimum …

The Poverty Of Prefectures: A Reevaluation Of The Memoir Of Zhang Daye, Joshua Defriez

Undergraduate Honors Capstone Projects

Everything today's readers know about the man Zhang Daye comes from his memoir, The World of a Tiny Insect (Wei Chong Shijie, 微蟲世界). The manuscript was distributed locally after its completion in 1894, though it never achieved wide-scale circulation. Wang Yongyuan of Zhejiang Normal University donated the only complete copy to the Chinese Academy of Sciences in the early 1950s where Harvard scholar Xiaofei Tian later discovered the manuscript. Since Tian's publication of an English translation in 2013, Zhang's writings have reached a wider audience than he likely ever imagined. As we read The World, Zhang's words …

Deconstructing The Third Rail: An Analysis Of The Issue Of Poverty In The United States Through The Lens Of Social Security, Nikita Mehandru

CMC Senior Theses

The ongoing debate over welfare in the United States is rooted in the long-standing tension between the nation’s commitment to providing for its most vulnerable and a deep-seated belief that such support can corrupt its recipients. Social Security has struck this balance and appeals to the masses with its pay-as-you-go system and universally distributed benefits. Yet, the solvency of Social Security is threatening the program that has attempted to guard against old age and disability for the last eighty years. This paper examines how the perception of poverty in the United States is a hindrance when tackling social welfare policies. …

Examining The Relationship Between Received Remittances And Education In Malawi, Kasvi Malik

CMC Senior Theses

This thesis examines the relationship between received remittances and education using random samples from panel survey data from households in rural Malawi collected between 2008 and 2010. Past research as well as that conducted in this paper point to the fact that remittances and education share an important correlation. The results of this study indicate that on a microeconomic level, remittances have a highly significant and positive impact on household education. Other remittance-related factors such as the distance from agent, the remittance amount, and the type of account held by an individual also have a significant impact on the highest …

¿Cómo La Profundización Financiera Afecta La Pobreza En Colombia? Un Análisis Econométrico Entre 1982 Y 2013, Yuli Tatiana Becerra Rojas, Luz Helena Vargas Porras

Economía

La siguiente investigación examina de manera empírica si la profundización financiera contribuye a que la pobreza disminuya en Colombia. Haciendo uso de datos de panel y con la valoración de estimadores GMM para 24 departamentos cubriendo 13 periodos entre 1982 y 2013 se analizó el efecto antes mencionado. Los resultados empíricos muestran de manera clara y significativa que la profundización financiera deprime a la pobreza, controlada por apertura comercial, inflación y crecimiento económico. Dichos resultados enfatizan la importancia del sistema financiero con la pobreza