Brief history of child poverty measurement

David Gordon

Chapter 1 in Handbook on Child Poverty and Inequality, 2025, pp 13-35 from Edward Elgar Publishing

Abstract: This chapter provides a brief 350-year history of child poverty measurement from a largely European perspective. The history of the scientific measurement of poverty usually makes little or no mention of children. However, children and their needs played a central role in both the invention of the poverty line and in the development of poverty measurement. The chapter describes the development of child poverty measurement, from the seventeenth century to the most recent rights-based multidimensional child poverty measures. The twenty-first century is a ‘golden age’ for child poverty measurement research, and the governments of the world have agreed to eradicate child poverty. However, they currently have no suitable, valid, reliable, and comparable child poverty measure with which to monitor progress. The conclusion discusses the possibility of producing comparable and meaningful child poverty measures that can be used in all countries, allowing for the huge differences in culture and living standards.

Keywords: Child poverty; Poverty line; Poverty measurement; Deprivation; History; Child rights (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
ISBN: 9781802200423
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