CROSS-NATIONAL POVERTY COMPARISONS USING RELATIVE POVERTY LINES: AN APPLICATION AND SOME LESSONS. ESRI Working Paper No. 9, June 1989

Nolan, Brian and Callan, Tim (1989) CROSS-NATIONAL POVERTY COMPARISONS USING RELATIVE POVERTY LINES: AN APPLICATION AND SOME LESSONS. ESRI Working Paper No. 9, June 1989. [Working Paper]

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Abstract

Comparisons of income inequality across countries have long formed an important element in research on income distribution, despite all the difficulties involved. The need to make such comparisons on the basis of data for different countries which are as closely co-ordinated as possible provided the major impetus to the development of the Luxembourg Income Study (LIS). Cross-country comparisons of the extent of poverty face even greater obstacles: not only must the data be as close to truly comparable as possible, but critical conceptual issues must be addressed. there is considerable scope for discussion about While what constitutes inequality and how we should measure it, at least there is a good deal of common ground about where income distribution comparisons may start with the decile distribution of gross or disposable income, for example, and a range of inequality measures. In the case of "poverty" comparisons, though, the key initial question to be resolved is what is meant by the term - only then can measurement begin.

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