How Poverty Falls

世界极端贫困人口比例从1981年的43%下降到1990年的36%，再到2015年的10%，这是人类取得的伟大成就之一。尽管取得了这样的成功，但人们对各国减少贫困的过程并没有很好地了解。这个研究项目将使用大量数据集和创新方法来研究这种贫困的减少是如何发生的：在几代人之间以及个别家庭摆脱贫困的过程中，他们的生活发生了什么变化。研究人员系统地使用了来自各国的详细家庭调查数据，这些国家自1990年以来总共减少了全球85%的贫困。该项目的目的是促进对促进共享繁荣的力量的理解，促进对贫困减少的科学素养和对经济学毕业生的培训。这项研究的结果将为美国和全球减少贫困的政策设计提供重要的投入。它还将使美国成为全球减贫研究的领导者。了解减少贫困的机制对于制定减少贫困的政策非常重要。本研究项目将使用来自许多国家的家庭和个人层面的数据，系统地描述和研究自1990年左右以来全球极端贫困下降背后的力量。该研究将考虑到结构变化、职业选择、劳动分工和劳动力市场的性别参与等因素的作用，研究家庭摆脱（和进入）极端贫困时收入变化的原因。这项研究还将考察这些世代内变化对总体贫困下降的重要性，相对于世代之间的动态，因为较贫穷的老一辈被较贫穷的年轻一代所取代。该研究将使用来自各国的具有全国和近全国代表性的纵向和重复横截面数据集，这些数据集占1990年以来全球极端贫困减少量的85%。这项研究的结果将为美国和全球减少贫困的政策设计提供重要的投入。它还将使美国成为全球减贫研究的领导者。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The share of the world’s population in extreme poverty declined from 43% in 1981 to 36% in 1990 to 10% in 2015, representing one of humanity’s great successes. Despite this success, the process by which poverty reduction takes place in nations is not well understood. This research project will use a large data set and innovative methods to study how this reduction in poverty happened: what changed across generations and within the lives of individual households as they moved out of poverty. The researchers do this systematically by using detailed household survey data from countries that collectively accounted for up to 85% of global poverty reduction since 1990. The project aims to advance understanding of the forces that give rise to shared prosperity, as well as contribute to scientific literacy about poverty’s decline and to graduate training in economics. The results of this research will provide important inputs into the design of policies to reduce poverty in the US and across the globe. It will also establish the US as the global leader in poverty reduction research.Understanding the mechanisms through which poverty decreases is important in crafting policies to reduce poverty. This research project will use household- and individual-level data from many countries to systematically describe and study the forces behind the global fall of extreme poverty since circa 1990. The research will examine what accounts for changes in households’ earnings as they exit from (and enter into) extreme poverty, considering the roles of structural change, occupational choice, the division of labor, and gendered participation in labor markets, among other factors. This research will also examine the importance of these within-generation changes in aggregate poverty decline, relative to between-generation dynamics, as older, poorer generations are replaced by younger, less-poor ones. The research will use nationally and near-nationally representative longitudinal and repeated cross-section datasets from countries that collectively account for as much as 85% of the global reduction in extreme poverty since 1990. The results of this research will provide important inputs into the design of policies to reduce poverty in the US and across the globe. It will also establish the US as the global leader in poverty reduction research.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.