Poverty and Inequality

The Poverty and Inequality Research Program has two main objectives: (1) improve current data as well as methods and tools for poverty and inequality analysis and (2) use the improved data and existing data sources to better understand the economic and social processes determining the extent of poverty and inequality and to assess the effectiveness of specific policies in reducing poverty.

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COVID-19: Costs, Consequences, and Urgent Choices
Research Newsletter, July 2021
This COVID-19 newsletter focuses on the costs, consequences, and urgent choices as COVID-19 continues to devastate lives and livelihoods. It includes research on the costs of the pandemic, the efficacy of government responses, and the promise of vaccines to slow and eventually halt the pandemic.
Poverty and Shared Prosperity 2020: Reversals of Fortune
October 2020
The report presents new estimates of COVID-19’s impacts on global poverty and inequality. Harnessing fresh data from frontline surveys and economic simulations, it shows that pandemic-related job losses and deprivation worldwide are hitting already-poor and vulnerable people hard, while also partly changing the profile of global poverty by creating millions of “new poor.” Furthermore, the report breaks ground by jointly analyzing three factors whose convergence is driving the current crisis and will extend its impact into the future: the COVID-19 pandemic, armed conflict, and climate change.
Report | Feature Story
Violence without Borders: The Internationalization of Crime and Conflict
June 2020
This Policy Research Report documents how permeable country borders have become in many different domains, and the troubling human and economic costs as the geographical spillovers of conflict and crime and political instability have intensified. The report suggests international institutions can play a critical role in stabilizing domestic fragility by moving settlement of disputes away from battlefields and toward global platforms.
Policy Research Report | Video | Blog

LATEST WORKING PAPERS

Transnational Terrorism and the Internet
Quy-Toan Do, Nicolas Gomez-Parra, Bob Rijkers
World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 9885, December 2021

A Puzzle with Missing Pieces: Explaining the Effectiveness of World Bank Development Projects
Louise Ashton, Jed Friedman, Diana Goldemberg, Mustafa Zakir Hussain, Thomas Kenyon, Akib Khan, Mo Zhou
World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 9884, December 2021

Taxation, Accountability, and Cash Transfers: Breaking the Resource Curse
Shantayanan Devarajan, Quy-Toan Do
World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 9880, December 2021

In Someone Else’s Shoes: Promoting Prosocial Behavior Through Perspective Taking
Marisol Rodríguez Chatruc, Sandra V. Rozo
World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 9866, November 2021

Does Race and Gender Inequality Impact Income Growth?
Gustavo A. Marrero, Juan Gabriel Rodríguez, Roy van der Weide
World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 9865, November 2021

Fair and Welfare-Consistent Global Income Poverty Measurement: Theory and Application
Benoit Decerf, Mery Ferrando, Natalie N. Quinn
World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 9844, November 2021

More Working Papers

LATEST JOURNAL ARTICLES

Children on the move: Progressive redistribution of humanitarian cash transfers among refugees
Berk Özler, Çiğdem Çelika, Scott Cunningham, P. Facundo Cuevasa, Luca Parisottoa
Journal of Development Economics 153: 102733, November 2021 | Working Paper Version

Too Young to Die: Deprivation Measures Combining Poverty and Premature Mortality
Jean-Marie Baland, Guilhem Cassan, Benoit Decerf
American Economic Journal: Applied Economics 13 (4): 226-57, October 2021

Lives and livelihoods: Estimates of the global mortality and poverty effects of the Covid-19 pandemic
Benoit Decerf, Francisco H. G. Ferreira, Daniel G.Mahler, Olivier Sterck
World Development 146: 105561, October 2021 | Working Paper Version | Blog

Disruptions in maternal and child health service utilization during COVID-19: analysis from eight sub-Saharan African countries
Gil Shapira, Tashrik Ahmed, Salomé Henriette Paulette Drouard, Pablo Amor Fernandez, Eeshani Kandpal, Charles Nzelu, Chea Sanford Wesseh, Nur Ali Mohamud, Francis Smart, Charles Mwansambo, Martina L Baye, Mamatou Diabate, Sylvain Yuma, Munirat Ogunlayi, Rwema Jean De Dieu Rusatira, Tawab Hashemi, Petra Vergeer, Jed Friedman
Health Policy and Planning 36(7): 1140–1151, August 2021