RESOURCES, DEPRIVATION AND THE MEASUREMENT OF POVERTY

Ringen has advocated the use of both income and deprivation criteria i n identifying those excluded from society due to lack of resources, a widely accepted definition of poverty. We illustrate with Irish data h ow this might be done, paying particular attention to how appropriate indicators of deprivation are to be selected. The results show that em ploying both income and deprivation criteria rather than income alone can make a substantial difference to both the extent and composition o f measured poverty. This highlights the restrictive nature of poverty conceived in terms of exclusion rather than minimum rights to resource s.