Poverty

Head Count Index (HCI)

This poverty index, commonly used by the World Bank, indicates how many percent of a country's population live on an income below the specified poverty line. Poverty here is measured on the basis of income. Those people whose per capita income is insufficient to meet their basic needs are counted as „poor“.

Human Poverty Index (HPI)

The „human poverty index", measured by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) includes in the measurement of non-monetary aspects of poverty in the form of three sub-indicators.

1. Likelihood at birth not to reach 40 years old.
2. Percentage of illiterate people
3. Percentage of the population without access to safe drinking water and health services plus the percentage of under-five children who are underweight.

The HPI takes a value between 0 and 100, where 0 is the minimum and 100 maximum poverty.

Human Development Index (HDI)

The "Human Development Index", also created by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), is similar to the HPI. It is mainly used to measure the level of development of individual countries. The HDI is composed of three parts.

1. The life expectancy
2. The level of education, as measured by the expected and average duration of schooling in years.
3. The standard of living, as measured by per capita income in real purchasing power (gross national income).

The HDI is calculated so that it lies between 0 and 1 for all countries. Countries with low HDIs are referred to as "poor" countries, those with high HDIs as "rich".

Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI)

The "multidimensional poverty index" has been used since 2010 in addition to the HDI (Human Development Index) by the United Nations Development Programme. The three dimensions of human development: education, health and standard of living are included based on 10 indicators (school enrolment, number of years of schooling, child mortality, nutrition, access to electricity, access to clean water, availability of toilets, floor, fuel and property). Thus, a household is considered "poor" if at least 30% of the indicators are insufficiently met. The MPI is intended to deal with the conditions of poverty more accurately than the HDI.

Participatory Poverty Assessment (PPA)

This method attempts to generate a subjective understanding of poverty through surveys and interviews with people. The collection of figures is not in the foreground, but the views of those affected. The World Bank has now gone over their monetary indicators with the results of PPAs corresponding to them; see the document "Voices of the Poor".

GINI-coefficient

The GINI-coefficient serves as a measure of distribution. The GINI-coefficient is employed in the measurement of poverty to describe the distribution of wealth and income and therefore to measure the level of social inequality. It takes values ranging from 0 to 1. A value of 0 means equal distribution, the higher the coefficient, the more unequal the distribution is. The GINI-coefficient is often used to describe the distribution of wealth and income in a country.

Gross national happiness (GNH)

Gross national happiness is intended to be an alternative to GDP, which defines prosperity solely based on monetary sums and economic growth. To measure the GNH, nine areas are used which are collected through surveys: ecology, culture, good governance, education, health and vitality of the communities, time use, psychological well-being and standard of living. The idea came from Bhutan's King Jigme Singye Wangchuck and the BNG was also utilised for the first time in that country. Although ridiculed by some parties, the UN has shown interest and is watching the development of this concept.