Estimating Growth Semi-Elasticity of Poverty Reduction Using Two Comparable Household Survey Datasets

ABSTRACTThe study estimates poverty-growth semi-elasticity using two comparable household survey which excludes the 2019 survey since it is a base year survey, thus, not technically comparable with earlier surveys. Poverty-growth semi-elasticity estimates suggest that the more the percentage point rise in growth, the more poverty would deteriorate. Results further suggest that the expected poverty incidence generated by 1% of growth is less than the expected poverty incidence when growth is either 5% or 10% or more. A major finding is that the estimates of poverty-growth semi-elasticity are highly responsive to marginal changes when choosing among poverty indices.KEYWORDS: ElasticitygrowthhouseholdNigeriapovertysemi-elasticitysurvey data AcknowledgmentsThe author hereby acknowledges the contributions of anonymous and independent expert reviewers for their valuable comments and suggestions on the manuscript. I would also like to thank discussants and participants at various conferences and seminars where earlier version of this article was presented for their valuable comments and suggestions. The author is grateful to the Editor(s) and Editorial Assistant(s) of the journal for their commitment.Disclosure statementNo potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).Data availability statementThe study used public data (HNLSS 2020 and NBS, Citation2004) obtained freely from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) of Nigeria.