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A Poor Means Test? Econometric Targeting in Africa / Caitlin Brown.
World Bank Open Knowledge Repository (formerly "World Bank E-Library Publications") Available online
World Bank Open Knowledge Repository (formerly "World Bank E-Library Publications")- Format:
- Book
- Government document
- Author/Creator:
- Brown, Caitlin.
- Series:
- Policy research working papers.
- World Bank e-Library.
- Language:
- English
- Subjects (All):
- Cash Transfers.
- Means Test.
- Poverty.
- Targeting.
- Local Subjects:
- Cash Transfers.
- Means Test.
- Poverty.
- Targeting.
- Physical Description:
- 1 online resource (55 pages)
- Place of Publication:
- Washington, D.C. : The World Bank, 2016.
- System Details:
- data file
- Summary:
- Proxy-means testing is a popular method of poverty targeting with imperfect information. In a now widely-used version, a regression for log consumption calibrates a proxy-means test score based on chosen covariates, which is then implemented for targeting out-of-sample. In this paper, the performance of various proxy-means testing methods is assessed using data for nine African countries. Standard proxy-means testing helps filter out the nonpoor, but excludes many poor people, thus diminishing the impact on poverty. Some methodological changes perform better, with a poverty-quantile method dominating in most cases. Even so, either a basic-income scheme or transfers using a simple demographic scorecard are found to do as well, or almost as well, in reducing poverty. However, even with a budget sufficient to eliminate poverty with full information, none of these targeting methods brings the poverty rate below about three-quarters of its initial value. The prevailing methods are particularly deficient in reaching the poorest.
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