Publication: The Insights and Illusions of Consumption Measurements
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2020-05
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2020-05-28
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Although household well-being is anchored in long-term average rates of consumption, welfare comparisons typically rely on shorter-duration survey measurements. This paper develops a new strategy to identify the distribution of these long-term rates by leveraging a large-scale randomization that elicited repeated short-duration measurements from diaries and recall questions. Identification stems from diary-recall differences in reports from the same household, does not require these reports to be error-free, and hinges on a research design with broad replicability. This strategy delivers cost-effective suggestions for designing survey modules to yield the most accurate measurements of consumption well-being, and offers new insights for interpreting and reconciling diary-recall differences in household expenditure surveys.
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“Battistin, Erich; De Nadai, Michele; Krishnan, Nandini. 2020. The Insights and Illusions of Consumption Measurements. Policy Research Working Paper;No. 9255. © World Bank. http://hdl.handle.net/10986/33818 License: CC BY 3.0 IGO.”
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