Poverty Measurement and Theories of Beneficence

Sreenivasan Subramanian

No RP2005-62, WIDER Working Paper Series from World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER)

Abstract: This note points to certain similarities of orientation and outcome between Derek Parfit's quest for a theory of beneficence and Amartya Sen's quest for a suitable real-valued representation of poverty. It suggests that both projects, in a certain sense, have been instructive failures. Using Sen's own work, the note also suggests a logically natural way of dealing with some of the problems in poverty measurement reviewed in it—but only to reject this way out on other compelling grounds.

Keywords: Equality and inequality; Index numbers (Economics); Poverty; Poverty measurement (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2005
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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