Vague language and precise measurement: the case of poverty

Qizilbash, Mozaffar

doi:10.1080/1350178032000042059

Cited by 57 publications

(38 citation statements)

References 2 publications

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“…Cheli and Lemmi (1995) consequently propose a fuzzy and relative approach to vulnerability, which enables them to define an "exposure to the risk of poverty" notion. The vulnerability concept used in Qizilbash (2003 and2006) is an individual's distance from a definite, unambiguous state of poverty. The closer the individual is to being definitely poor, the greater his vulnerability.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Employment Vulnerability and Earnings in Urban West Africa

2010

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Abstract:In this article, we develop indicators of vulnerability in employment in seven economic capitals of West Africa (Abidjan, Bamako, Cotonou, Dakar, Lome, Niamey, and Ouagadougou) and study their links with individual incomes from the main job. We draw on data from the 1-2-3 Surveys in 2002-2003 to make a cross-country comparison using rigorously the same variables and methodology for each country. The theory of compensating differentials states that workers may receive pecuniary compensation commensurate with the strenuous or hazardous nature of their tasks or adverse working conditions. Our interpretation of the link between employment status and incomes draws on these developments, applying them to both working conditions themselves and more broadly to vulnerability in employment. The main tested assumption is that high levels of employment vulnerability could be compensated by greater earnings. Following recent work by Fernandez and Nordman (2009), we allow for individual and job characteristics (the latter being used to construct the composite index of vulnerability) to be differentially valued for conditionally high and low income earners.Our composite index of employment vulnerability indicates that 85% of the private sector workers in all the economic capitals studied are vulnerable on the basis of at least one criterion. The results show that the average impact of vulnerability on earnings is generally negative for an average level of vulnerability. In the formal private sector of the West African cities, losses of income due to vulnerability are lower for high levels of vulnerability, but do not translate into gains. In the informal sector, however, the average predicted income for a high vulnerability level is higher than the average predicted income for a low vulnerability level. The assumption that average gains may compensate for a certain level of vulnerability is thus confirmed in the informal sector. Quantile earnings regressions show that the impact of vulnerability on earnings is not uniform, particularly in the informal sector where the marginal impact of vulnerability is often positive for higher deciles of the conditional earnings distribution. Consequently, even for average levels of vulnerability, premium pay is found for workers at the top of the distribution. Lastly, we show that the different aspects of vulnerability have diverse impacts on earnings. While there is no compensation for contractual insecurity and itinerant and solitary jobs, visible underemployment generally has a positive impact on the average incomes of workers in these West African cities. Résumé:Dans cet article, nous construisons des indicateurs de la vulnérabilité au travail dans sept capitales économiques d'Afrique de l'Ouest (Abidjan, Bamako, Cotonou, Dakar, Lomé, Niamey, Ouagadougou) et étudions leurs liens avec les revenus individuels de l'activité principale. Selon la théorie des salaires compensatoires, les travailleurs pourraient recevoir des compensations pécuniaires à hauteur de la pénibilité de leu...

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Employment Vulnerability and Earnings in Urban West Africa

2010

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“…To this end, the use of vague theories such as fuzzy logic (Zadeh, 1965;Zimmermann, 2001) or supervaluationist logic (Keefe, 2000(Keefe, , 2008Qizilbash, 2003) might perhaps prove helpful. cfroe Cash flow return on equity IRR of (−e 0 , e 1 , .…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Splitting up value: A critical review of residual income theories

Magni

2009

European Journal of Operational Research

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This paper deals with the notion of residual income, which may be defined as the surplus profit that residues after a capital charge (opportunity cost) has been covered. While the origins of the notion trace back to the 19th century, in-depth theoretical investigations and widespread real-life applications are relatively recent and concern an interdisciplinary field connecting management accounting, corporate finance and financial mathematics (Peasnell, 1981(Peasnell, , 1982Peccati, 1987Peccati, , 1989Peccati, , 1991Stewart, 1991;Ohlson, 1995; Arnold and Davies, 2000;Young and O'Byrne, 2001;Martin, Petty and Rich, 2003). This paper presents both a historical outline of its birth and development and an overview of the main recent contributions regarding capital budgeting decisions, production and sales decisions, implementation of optimal portfolios, forecasts of asset prices and calculation of intrinsic values. A most recent theory, the systemic-value-added approach (also named lost-capital paradigm), provides a different definition of residual income, consistent with arbitrage theory. Enfolded in Keynes's (1936) notion of user cost and forerun by Pressacco and Stucchi (1997), the theory has been formally introduced in Magni (2000a,b,c;2001a,b;, where its properties are thoroughly investigated as well as its relations with the standard theory; two different lost-capital metrics have been considered, for value-based management purposes, by Drukarczyk and Schueler (2000) and Young and O'Byrne (2001). This work illustrates the main properties of the two theories and their relations, and provides a minimal guide to construction of performance metrics in the two approaches. Running title. A Critical Review of Residual Income TheoriesScientific areas. Corporate finance, management accounting, financial mathematics.

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“…In particular, a vague approach to reckoning poverty is compatible with postulating a 'fuzzy membership function', which assigns a 'poverty status' in the interval [0,1] to each individual income in a distribution. On fuzzy poverty measurement, the reader is referred to, among others, Kundu and Smith (1983), Shorrocks and Subramanian (1994), Chiappero-Martinetti (2000), Qizilbash (2003), and Subramanian (2009b). (It should be noted that the fuzzy approach described in this paper corresponds to what Qizilbash 2003 calls the 'degree' approach, and which he distinguishes from 'epistemic' and 'supervaluationist' approaches to accounting for vague predicates.…”

Section: Where Focus Is Irrelevant: Further Examples Of Measures Whicmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Focus Axiom and Poverty: On the Co-existence of Precise Language and Ambiguous Meaning in Economic Measurement

Subramanian

2012

Economics

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Despite the formal rigour that attends social and economic measurement, the substantive meaning of particular measures could be compromised in the absence of a clear and coherent conceptualization of the phenomenon being measured. A case in point is afforded by the status of a 'focus axiom' in the measurement of poverty. 'Focus' requires that a measure of poverty ought to be sensitive only to changes in the income-distribution of the poor population of any society. In practice, most poverty indices advanced in the literature satisfy an 'incomefocus' but not a 'population-focus' axiom. This, it is argued in the present paper, makes for an incoherent underlying conception of poverty. The paper provides examples of poverty measures which either satisfy both income and population focus or violate both, or which effectively do not recognize a clear dichotomization of a population into its poor and non-poor components, and suggests that such measures possess a virtue of consistency, and coherent meaning, lacking in most extant measures of poverty available in the literature.Paper submitted to the special issue The Measurement of Inequality and Well-Being: New Perspectives JEL B40, D31, D63, I32, O15

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Vague language and precise measurement: the case of poverty

Cited by 57 publications

References 2 publications

Employment Vulnerability and Earnings in Urban West Africa

Employment Vulnerability and Earnings in Urban West Africa

Splitting up value: A critical review of residual income theories

The Focus Axiom and Poverty: On the Co-existence of Precise Language and Ambiguous Meaning in Economic Measurement

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