Intrahousehold distribution and poverty: Evidence from Côte d'Ivoire

Poverty measures often ignore the distribution of resources within families and the gains from joint consumption. In this paper, we estimate the allocation process and adult economies of scale in households from Côte d'Ivoire using a collective model of household consumption. Identification relies on the observation of adult-specific goods, as in the Rothbarth method, and a joint estimation on couples and singles. Our results show that men and women's shares of total expenditure are of the same order of magnitude and children's shares are small. Scale economies are large and affect poverty measures.