| 来源类型 | Working Paper |
| 规范类型 | 报告 |
| DOI | 10.3386/w16555 |
| 来源ID | Working Paper 16555 |
| A Revealed Preference Approach to Measuring Hunger and Undernutrition | |
| Robert T. Jensen; Nolan H. Miller | |
| 发表日期 | 2010-11-25 |
| 出版年 | 2010 |
| 语种 | 英语 |
| 摘要 | Caloric intake and minimum calorie thresholds are widely used in developing countries to assess hunger and nutrition, and to construct poverty lines. However, it is generally recognized that the sufficiency of an individual's caloric intake cannot be determined, due to: a lack of consensus on the true thresholds; the fact that any such thresholds are individual-varying and unobservable; imperfect nutrient absorption; and the weak and non-monotonic empirical relationship between calories and wealth. We propose a revealed preference approach to measuring hunger and undernutrition that overcomes these challenges. Low caloric intake is associated with a large utility penalty (e.g., physical discomfort). The corresponding high marginal utility of calories causes a utility-maximizing consumer to primarily consume the cheapest available source of calories (a staple). Once they have surpassed subsistence, the marginal utility of calories declines significantly and they substitute towards foods with higher levels of non-nutritional attributes (e.g., taste). Thus, though any individual's requirements are unobserved, their choice to switch away from the staple reveals they are above that requirement. Accordingly, the percent of calories obtained from the staple can be used to indicate nutritional sufficiency. We also provide an application for China that shows the desirable empirical properties of this approach. |
| 主题 | Health, Education, and Welfare ; Poverty and Wellbeing ; Development and Growth ; Development ; Environmental and Resource Economics ; Agriculture |
| URL | https://www.nber.org/papers/w16555 |
| 来源智库 | National Bureau of Economic Research (United States) |
| 引用统计 | |
| 资源类型 | 智库出版物 |
| 条目标识符 | http://119.78.100.153/handle/2XGU8XDN/574230 |
| 推荐引用方式 GB/T 7714 | Robert T. Jensen,Nolan H. Miller. A Revealed Preference Approach to Measuring Hunger and Undernutrition. 2010. |
| 条目包含的文件 | ||||||
| 文件名称/大小 | 资源类型 | 版本类型 | 开放类型 | 使用许可 | ||
| w16555.pdf（179KB） | 智库出版物 | 限制开放 | CC BY-NC-SA | 浏览 | ||
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