No abstract

Successfully addressing social inequalities requires moving from one-dimensional to multidimensional poverty measures, but evidence on Australia is still largely reliant on the former. Using panel data and counterfactual simulations, we examine the relative roles of material resources, employment, education, health, social support, community participation, and safety perceptions in explaining changes in multidimensional poverty in Australia between 2001 and 2012. We find that year-on-year absolute changes in multidimensional poverty are mainly driven by fluctuations in social support, community participation, and health. Social support, health and material resources increased relative poverty, whereas personal safety, employment, community participation and education reduced it. Changes in socio-economic returns to parental characteristics had also some impacts on changes in poverty rates. These findings constitute evidence that integrating non-income indicators of wellbeing in Australian policies aimed at addressing poverty would enhance their effectiveness and efficiency.

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Typhoons, floods, and other weather-related shocks can inflict suffering on local populations and create life-threatening conditions for the poor. Yet, natural disasters also present a development opportunity to upgrade capital stock, adopt new technologies, enhance the risk-resiliency of existing systems, and raise standards of living. This is akin to the "creative destruction" hypothesis coined by economist Joseph Schumpeter in 1943 to describe the process where innovation, learning, and growth promote advanced technologies as conventional technologies become outmoded. To test the hypothesis in the context of natural disasters, this paper takes the case of the Philippines-among the most vulnerable countries in the world to such disasters, especially typhoons. Using synthetic panel data regressions, the paper shows that typhoon-affected households are more likely to fall into lower income levels, although disasters can also promote economic growth. Augmenting the household data with municipal fiscal data, the analysis shows some evidence of the creative destruction effect: Municipal governments in the Philippines helped mitigate the poverty impact by allocating more fiscal resources to build local resilience while also utilizing additional funds poured in by the national government for rehabilitation and reconstruction.