Poverty is measured in different ways by researchers, governments, and other institutions. One method that is used often is to analyse data on the income and consumption expenditures of individuals and households. But this approach comes with data collection challenges. As studies have found a link between asset poverty and monetary poverty, asset-based measures can be used as an alternative in poverty research.
Using data from the Kenya demographic and health surveys, this study assesses different methods of measuring poverty by comparing the poverty statistics calculated from three poverty measurement methods. The researchers also investigate the importance of assessing the internal reliability of the indicators used in poverty measurement – in this case, the indicators that comprise the asset index that was used in the poverty measurement.
