USING HOUSING ITEMS TO INDICATE SOCIOECONOMIC-STATUS - LATIN-AMERICA

This note explores the possibility of using physical housing quality i nformation from censuses to help indicate socioeconomic status, partic ularly that of children, elderly people and women in developing areas such as Latin America. We develop a comparative scale from six housing items (wall material, floor material, roof material, availability of electricity, type of sewerage and water facilities) since these items are recommended by the U.N., tend to be present in most housing census es, tend to be highly related to each other and tend to have a similar valuation. A more basic three-item scale, consisting of the last thre e items listed above, is also discussed because this scale might be ev en more widely available while providing valuable, aggregated, informa tion. The six-item and three-item scales correlate highly with each ot her. There is a wide range among Latin American countries in people's distribution along the scales but the scales themselves seem applicabl e everywhere. Not only have they been proving useful in our own resear ch, but both scales correlate fairly well with a country's infant mort ality rate on the aggregate level and with an individual's educational attainment among men and women 15 to 59 and among elderly people 60 y ears of age and older.