David Stifel

TL;DR: In this paper, an asset-based alternative to the standard use of expenditures in defining well-being and poverty is considered, and the authors find that the asset index is a valid predictor of a crucial manifestation of poverty.

TL;DR: This article used Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS) to compare "poverty" at two or more points in time within and between African countries, and found that the majority of the improvements were due to improvements in rural areas.

TL;DR: In this paper, the relative importance of rural versus urban areas in terms of monetary poverty and seven other related living standards indicators is examined, and the relative and absolute rates of change for urban and rural areas are examined.

TL;DR: In this paper, the authors examined the mechanisms that transmit isolation into productivity in the case of Madagascar and found that the inverse relationship between agricultural productivity and isolation is surprisingly strong, and identified the following reasons why productivity might decline with isolation: transportation-induced transaction costs, increasing price variability and extensification onto less fertile land and insecurity.

TL;DR: In this article, the authors analyze demographic and health surveys to examine the progress of African countries in achieving six of the seven millennium development goals (MDG) set forth by the United Nations and conclude that despite some noteworthy progress, the evidence suggests that, in the absence of dramatic changes in the rates of improvement in most measures of living standards, the MDG will not be reached for most indicators in most countries.