Comparison of two approaches for measuring household wealth via an asset-based index in rural and peri-urban settings of Hunan province, China

Abstract

BackgroundThere are growing concerns regarding inequities in health, with poverty being an important determinant of health as well as a product of health status. Within the People's Republic of China (P.R. China), disparities in socio-economic position are apparent, with the rural-urban gap of particular concern. Our aim was to compare direct and proxy methods of estimating household wealth in a rural and a peri-urban setting of Hunan province, P.R. China.MethodsWe collected data on ownership of household durable assets, housing characteristics, and utility and sanitation variables in two village-wide surveys in Hunan province. We employed principal components analysis (PCA) and principal axis factoring (PAF) to generate household asset-based proxy wealth indices. Households were grouped into quartiles, from 'most wealthy' to 'most poor'. We compared the estimated household wealth for each approach. Asset-based proxy wealth indices were compared to those based on self-reported average annual income and savings at the household level.ResultsSpearman's rank correlation analysis revealed that PCA and PAF yielded similar results, indicating that either approach may be used for estimating household wealth. In both settings investigated, the two indices were significantly associated with self-reported average annual income and combined income and savings, but not with savings alone. However, low correlation coefficients between the proxy and direct measures of wealth indicated that they are not complementary. We found wide disparities in ownership of household durable assets, and utility and sanitation variables, within and between settings.ConclusionPCA and PAF yielded almost identical results and generated robust proxy wealth indices and categories. Pooled data from the rural and peri-urban settings highlighted structural differences in wealth, most likely a result of localized urbanization and modernization. Further research is needed to improve measurements of wealth in low-income and transitional country contexts.

Indexing household resilience to food insecurity shocks: The case of South Sudan

“…Earlier socio-economic measurement approaches dwelt on money metric measures such as the Gini coefficient, Purchasing Power Parity and gross domestic product (GDP) per capita. These so-called "direct" measures of socio-economic status (The World Bank, 2004;Balen et al, 2010) are heavily based on income, consumption and financial assets such as savings and pensions.…”

Health Access Livelihood Framework Reveals Potential Barriers in the Control of Schistosomiasis in the Dongting Lake Area of Hunan Province, China

“…Poverty is a key social determinant of schistosomiasis [24]–[26], [38], [41], [42], [61]. We found that patients with advanced schistosomiasis were among the poorest individuals in the community.…”

Impact evaluation of schistosomiasis control into elimination interventions models in P. R. China and Africa

“…Sustainability of local strategies towards interrupting schistosomiasis transmission elimination also requires improving sanitation by supplying clean drinking water and improving WASH approach in remote rural communities/ dwellings including intensive health education a continuous awareness and resilience [2,15,29,[93][94][95]. Moreover, to nurture schistosomiasis ownership and reinforcement of public-private partnership and collaboration including the local community in sustained funding support from government and international organizations and development of disease resilience culture are proactive and efficient ways in revamping the persistent morbidity and mortality of this diseases China and mainly in sub-Saharan Africa [3,5,19,96,[99][100][101][102].…”