Is Poverty in Africa Mostly Chronic or Transient? : Evidence from Synthetic Panel Data
Absent actual panel household survey data, this paper constructs, for the first time, synthetic panel data for more than 20 countries accounting for two-thirds of the population in Sub-Saharan Africa. In this process, the analysis employs repeated...
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| Language: | English en_US |
| Published: |
World Bank, Washington, DC
2017
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/172891492703250779/Is-Poverty-in-Africa-mostly-chronic-or-transient-evidence-from-synthetic-panel-data http://hdl.handle.net/10986/26471 |
| Summary: | Absent actual panel household survey
data, this paper constructs, for the first time, synthetic
panel data for more than 20 countries accounting for
two-thirds of the population in Sub-Saharan Africa. In this
process, the analysis employs repeated cross sections that
span, on average, a six-year period for each country. The
analysis suggests that all these countries as a whole have
had pro-poor growth. One-third of the poor population
escaped poverty during the studied period, which is larger
than the proportion of the population that fell into poverty
in the same period. The region also saw a 9 percent
reduction in poverty and a 28 percent increase in the size
of the middle class. However, chronic poverty remains high,
and a considerable proportion of the population is
vulnerable to falling into poverty. There is some limited
evidence that most resource-rich and middle-income countries
have more upward mobility than downward mobility.
Post-secondary education is especially strongly associated
with higher upward mobility and less downward mobility,
which holds to some extent for female-headed and urban households. |
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