The Insights and Illusions of Consumption Measurements

Arbeitspapier

While household well-being derives from long-term average rates of consumption, welfare comparisons typically rely on shorter-duration survey measurements. We develop a new strategy to identify the distribution of these long-term rates by leveraging a large-scale randomization in Iraq that elicited repeated short-duration measurements from diaries and recall questions. Identification stems from diary-recall differences in reports from the same household, does not require reports to be error-free, and hinges on a research design with broad replicability. Our strategy delivers practical and costeffective suggestions for designing survey modules to yield the closest measurements of consumption well-being. In addition, we find little empirical support for the claim that acquisition diaries yield the most accurate measurement of poverty and inequality and offer new insights to interpret and reconcile diary-recall differences in household surveys.

Object Details

• Language: Englisch

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: Series: IZA Discussion Papers ; No. 13222

Classification and Topics

• Classification: Wirtschaft ; Methodology for Collecting, Estimating, and Organizing Microeconomic Data; Data Access ; Personal Income, Wealth, and Their Distributions ; Equity, Justice, Inequality, and Other Normative Criteria and Measurement ; Macroeconomics: Consumption; Saving; Wealth ; Measurement and Analysis of Poverty
• Subject: modes of data collection ; measurement of inequality and poverty ; household surveys

Contributors, Places and Time

• Event: Geistige Schöpfung
• (who): Battistin, Erich ; De Nadai, Michele ; Krishnan, Nandini
• Event: Veröffentlichung
• (who): Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)
• (where): Bonn
• (when): 2020

Further information

• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/223664
• Last update: 10.03.2025, 11:43 AM CET