Other Poverty Study
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Publication
Latin America and the Caribbean Macro Poverty Outlook: Country-by-Country Analysis and Projections for the Developing World
(Washington, DC, 2022-04)This edition of the Macro Poverty Outlook periodical contains country-by-country forecasts and overviews for GDP, fiscal, debt and poverty indicators for the developing countries of the Latin America and the Caribbean region. Macroeconomic indicators such as population, gross domestic product and gross domestic product per capita - and where available – other indicators such as primary school enrollment, life expectancy at birth, total greenhouse gas emissions and inflation, among others, are included for each country. In addition to the World Bank’s most recent forecasts, Key conditions and challenges, recent developments and outlook are briefly described for each country in the region. -
Publication
The Gradual Rise and Rapid Decline of the Middle Class in Latin America and the Caribbean
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-05-20)Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) reported over 30 million Coronavirus (COVID-19) cases and around 960,000 deaths as of May 2021. Official tracking data shows that Brazil, Colombia, and Argentina have the highest number of reported cases throughout LAC, which in turn is the region with among the highest numbers across all developing regions. Moreover, Brazil is the third-worst affected country worldwide, after the United States and India, with approximately 15.4 million infections. Dramatic declines in economic activity are expected throughout the LAC region due to the global pandemic. Unfortunately, many LAC countries entered the crisis with low potential economic growth and high levels of inequality, following the region’s recent period of stagnant growth. The 2020 COVID-19 crisis will likely reverse in a short time frame many of the social gains that took decades to materialize in Latin America and the Caribbean. In the past two decades, the region has seen a reduction in the number of people living in poverty by nearly half and an increase in the size of its middle class. Income inequality also decreased, as income growth has been primarily pro-poor in recent years. Despite variations across countries, most have experienced positive welfare gains since the early 2000s. However, the growth deceleration of 2014–2019 coupled with the dramatic fall in activity caused by the COVID-19 crisis will negatively impact living standards and well-being across the region. Poverty projections for 2020 suggest that the number of the poor increased in most LAC countries. Brazil, however, implemented a generous emergency transfer program that benefited almost 67 million people and lifted millions out of poverty. As a result, poverty in the LAC region is expected to decline marginally from 22 percent in 2019 to 21.8 percent in 2020. Had no mitigation measures been implemented, the region may instead have seen 28 million new poor in 2020. -
Publication
Do Labor Markets Limit the Inclusiveness of Growth in the Dominican Republic?
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2017-08-01)The strong economic growth enjoyed by the Dominican Republic following its 2003 domestic crisis was not matched by similarly substantial progress in poverty reduction. While labor productivity grew by an estimated 39 percent between 2000 and 2013, real wages fell with the crisis in 2003/04, and, in 2013, remained below their pre-crisis level. This report presents an assessment of factors related to the functioning of the labor markets that constrained more inclusive growth in the Dominican Republic. It explores several hypotheses related to labor supply factors, job creation, and global trends in returns to labor, as well as issues with statistical measurements that contribute to explain the weak relationship observed between growth and poverty reduction. The analysis finds that growth appears to have been driven by productivity increases rather than by increases in labor inputs. At the same time, low-skilled workers became increasingly concentrated in low-quality jobs and in sectors that saw low productivity growth, a trend enhanced by the loss of manufacturing jobs since 2000. Low rates of labor force participation, particularly among the poor, further limited the ability of households to benefit from growth. -
Publication
The Distributional Consequences of Increasing Tobacco Taxes on Colombia’s Health and Finances: An Extended Cost-Effectiveness Analysis
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2017)Since 2008, when Colombia ratified the Framework Convention for Tobacco Control, available evidence of the impact of tobacco consumption, its health effects, and low tax revenues resulting from low tobacco taxation and prices had grown. By 2015, Colombia’s cigarette prices stood higher than only one other country in the region, and smoking had become the second leading modifiable risk factor for premature mortality. At that time, reduced fiscal revenues resulting from a sharp drop in oil prices, accompanied by growing demand for government spending arising partly from a change in legislation that increased health benefits for the lower socioeconomic population, led to a call for tax reform. The preparation of the document was accompanied by technical training, studies, and public fora with national and international experts, civil society, and academia presenting evidences and arguing for increased taxation to lead to a reduction in tobacco consumption and, in the future, a reduction in costs to the health system. The fora and open dialogue helped align strategies of the Ministry of Health and Social Protection, and the Ministry of Finance in presenting the reform to Congress for approval with a larger academic and civil society support for this measure. In December 2016, resulting from the above-mentioned efforts, Colombia passed a major tax increase on tobacco products with the goal of decreasing smoking and improving population health. While tobacco taxes are known to be highly effective in reducing the prevalence of smoking, they are often criticized as being regressive in consumption. This analysis attempts to assess the distributional impact (across income quintiles) of the new tax on selected health and financial outcomes. -
Publication
Cyclical Variations in Participation and Employment in Urban Brazil
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2016-05-01)Brazilian labor markets have performed very strongly for most of the last 15 years, with dramatic increases in the employment rate of unskilled workers and significant declines in the overall unemployment rate. However, the economic and political developments and fiscal crisis of the last sixteen months in Brazil have resulted in a substantial decline in the rate of economic activity , a dramatic slowdown in the rate of new job creation a devaluation of the domestic currency and increasing concerns about the sustainability of the gains in poverty reduction and inequality accomplished during the years of the commodity boom. The decline in economic activity has raised concerns again about increasing unemployment rates, and the extent to which these developments will have an adverse impact on specific age and gender groups. Efforts to maintain or increase the proportion of the population employed in the aggregate or within any specific demographic group must take into consideration how the unemployment rate and the labor force participation rate of the group vary with changes in the level of economic activity. The sensitivity of the proportion of the population employed to changes in the level of aggregate demand is a key parameter informing the design of an appropriate and effective labor market policy. Specifically, teenagers and young women between 20-34 years of age comprise only 25 percent of the adult population, but they account for more than 50 percent of the cyclical variation in employment. In contrast, adult men between 26 and 64 years of age, who comprise 32.6 per cent of the population in the US account for only 23.6 percent of the change in the cyclical variation in employment. Estimates of the sensitivity of the proportion of the population employed to changes in the level of aggregate demand based on data from recent years that reflect the prevailing structural relationships between labor demand and employment and labor supply, labor force participation and unemployment are more useful for predicting how labor force participation is likely to react to the downturn in economic activity since the end of the commodity boom and the onset of the economic crisis in Brazil. The purpose of this paper is to examine two inter-related questions about the behavior of the labor market in Brazil. The first question is about the direction and sensitivity of the labor force participation rate, and the employment rate to changes in the level of aggregate demand. The second question relates to the differences in the cyclical sensitivity of these key variables across age and gender groups.The next section of the paper discusses the recent macroeconomic context, and some of the limitations associated with using Pesquisa Nacional por Amostra de Domicílios (PNAD) data to predict changes in the on the labor force participation rate of different age gender and skill groups during the crisis. Section 3 discusses the data and the model used -
Publication
Volatility and Inequality as Constraints to Shared Prosperity : Paraguay Equity Assessment
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2015-01)Isolated by nature, and recovering from a period of historically low growth during the eighties and nineties, Paraguay faced many economic and social challenges at the beginning of the twenty first century. By year 2000, Paraguay GDP per capita was only 50 percent of the Latin American average and 34 percent of its MERCOSUR partners. High poverty and inequality were an inherent characteristic of the country. Yet, between 2003 and 2013, Paraguay has performed substantially well, seeing a reduction in moderate and extreme (monetary) poverty. This is essentially the result of a period of average significant growth combined with a reduction in inequality. This report explores the factors associated to the observed improvements in welfare and inequality, and investigates the challenges facing their sustainability, given the historical structural problems of Paraguay to maintain growth and improve social indicators. The underlying question is indeed whether the growth model and reduction in inequality are consistent with a positive social dynamics, taking a comprehensive definition of equity, which includes sustainable elimination of absolute poverty, enhancing equality of opportunity and strengthening agency for all groups. -
Publication
Colombia’s 2012 Tax Reform: Poverty and Social Impact Analysis
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2014-11)This report summarizes the results of the PSIA and explains the three analyses used to determine the impact of the tax reform. The first analysis integrates data from administrative tax records with household statistics from the Gran Encuesta Integrada de Hogares (GEIH) conducted by the Departamento Administrativo Nacional de Estadística (DANE) to correct for the problem of underrepresentation of high-income households that is typical of household surveys. The second analysis, which is based on consumption data from the Encuesta de Calidad de Vida (ENCV) also conducted by DANE, follows the LATAX micro-simulation technique and focuses on the effect of taxes on income distribution and on government revenues on the assumption that individuals’ purchasing habits remain the same. The third analysis uses a general equilibrium model of the labor market to estimate the impact of the tax reforms on the labor market and on informality. The first analysis shows that the effects of Colombia’s income tax reform serve the intended purpose of reducing income inequality. Results based on the constructed full income distribution, which uses administrative tax records and household survey data, indicate that the Gini coefficient decreases from 0.586 to 0.579. Considering that the average yearly reduction of the Gini coefficient in Latin America over the last 10 years was 0.51 percentage points, the estimated reduction in Colombia’s Gini coefficient is not trivial. These results also demonstrate the importance of using the full income distribution to calculate true inequality in a country. -
Publication
Assessing Poverty Measurement Practices and Statistical Capacity in Central America
(Washington, DC, 2012-05)It is important for countries to measure and track poverty as frequently and accurately as possible, particularly in Central America. That information allows identifying the poor and keeping them on the agenda, understanding the evolution of poverty trends over the short and long term, assessing the determinants of poverty, targeting policy interventions geared to poor people, and evaluating the effectiveness of policy actions. The need to frequently updating and collecting precise and inclusive poverty data is critical for countries in Central America, a sub-region that has proven vulnerable to various types of shocks in the past (including the recent fuel, food price, and financial crises from 2007-2008). Of particular importance for governments and donors is the issue of calculating poverty at high levels of geographic disaggregation to help them best target policy interventions for poor and vulnerable populations, while efficiently allocating resources. Notwithstanding important advances in recent years, there are a variety of elements in current poverty measurement and mapping practices in Central America that are susceptible to further improvement. The purpose of this note is to take stock of current poverty measurement practices and the status of statistical capacity for effective poverty measurement in Central America. The first section reviews the main aspects that characterize poverty methodologies currently employed by each of the six countries in Central America, laying out similarities and differences and highlighting where there's room for improvement. The second section takes a closer look at national statistical capacity for poverty data collection and evaluation, with a special focus on periodicity. The final section lays out the key constraints to poverty measurement in Central America parsed out by the topics of poverty measurement methodology, poverty mapping, and statistical capacity. -
Publication
Exiting Belindia? Lesson from the Recent Decline in Income Inequality in Brazil
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2012)After decades of persistent disparities, inequality in Brazil has fallen steadily over the last fifteen years. This robust rate of decline has surpassed the pace of the Latin American region as a whole, and is taking place as inequality rises in several rapid-growth emerging economies in other regions. This document examines the recent trend in income inequality in Brazil, its key policy drivers and some of the challenges ahead. It aims at capturing some of the lessons behind Brazil?s experience to share with other economies in the region and beyond. -
Publication
Jamaica : Poverty and Social Impacts of Fiscal Reforms
(Washington, DC, 2012)This Poverty and Social Impact Analysis (PSIA) explores the distributional effects of a package of fiscal reforms initiated by the Government of Jamaica and supported by the World Bank under the programmatic fiscal sustainability Development Policy Loan (DPL) series. The DPL series supports improved budget and debt management in order to reduce the debt overhang and create additional fiscal space for productive public spending, including social expenditures. The PSIA discusses the poverty and distributional impacts of the prior actions supported under the DPL, with a particular focus on two reform actions likely to have the most significant impacts: (1) tax reform and (2) public sector reform, focusing on rationalization of public bodies. The report offers both quantitative and qualitative assessments of the potential poverty and distributional effects of these policy changes. The report is structured as follows: section two analyzes the expected impact of changes in tax policy; section three investigates the potential impacts of public bodies' rationalization, and section four offers some caveats and concluding remarks. Each section begins with a discussion of the reform background as well as the major supporters and opponents of the reform. The analysis in each section is presented with the least possible amount of technical details in order to maximize the appeal to a broader audience. For the interested reader, the methodological details of the empirical approaches employed in this report are contained in the annexes.