Vulnerability to poverty: empirical findings

Vulnerability to poverty, interpreted as a forward-looking inclusion of uncertainty in the analysis of poverty, has only recently become part of the literature on poverty. This chapter first introduces different definitions of vulnerability to poverty, and then moves on to more operational aspects of its measurement. Through a review of the existing literature, a series of approaches is presented for the selection of an indicator of vulnerability, the development of methods for forecasting future outcomes and variability of the indicator, and finally the identification of a vulnerability threshold. The chapter concludes with an overview of the covariates used by the literature to assess future poverty status, and presents some final remarks.