Remittances and poverty in Guatemala

By R. H. Adams. 2004

229 citations recorded by the source corpus.

The author uses a large, nationally representative household survey to analyze the impact of internal remittances (from Guatemala), and international remittances (from the United States) on poverty in Guatemala. With only one exception, he finds that both internal and international remittances reduce the level, depth, and severity of poverty in Guatemala. However, he finds that remittances have a greater impact on reducing the severity as opposed to the level of poverty in Guatemala. For example, the squared poverty gap-which measures the severity of poverty-falls by 21.1 percent when internal remittances are included in household income, and by 19.8 percent when international remittances are included in such income. This is true because households in the lowest decile group receive a very large share of their total household income (expenditure) from remittances. Households in the bottom decile group receive between 50 and 60 percent of their total income (expenditure) from remittances. When these"poorest of the poor"households receive remittances, their income status changes dramatically and this in turn has a large effect on any poverty measure-like the squared poverty gap-that considers the number, distance, and distribution of poor households beneath the poverty line.

Subfields: Safety Research, Sociology and Political Science

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Citations in the corpus

Workers' remittances, economic growth and poverty in developing Asia and the Pacific countries (2007, background): “Likewise, while Stahl (1982) finds that remittances would not benefit the poor, Adams and Page (2005) and IMF (2005) find positive and significant impacts of remittances on poverty reduction.”
No hay ganancia en la milpa: the agrarian question, food sovereignty, and the on-farm conservation of agrobiodiversity in the Guatemalan highlands (2009, background): “Moreover, analysis by Adams (2004) shows that international remittances tend to exacerbate”
The Impact of Remittances on Poverty and Human Capital: Evidence from Latin American Household Surveys (2007, methodology): “With data from Guatemala, Adams (2004) illustrates how the incorporation or not of this correction can lead to either positive or negative effects of remittances on poverty.”
Remittances and Poverty in Ghana (2009, unknown): “This is the approach followed by Adams (2004, 2006), Guzman et al (2006), Mukherjee and Benson (2003), Quartey and Blankson (2004), Quartey (2006), and Glewe (1991).”
Migration, entrepreneurship and development: critical questions (2017, background): “Migration has also been found to contribute to raising living standards of those left behind (Acosta et al. 2007; Adams 1991, 2004, 2006; Adams and Page 2003, 2005; Itzigsohn 1995; Taylor et al. 2005) as well as increased human capital, brain gain and better return to human capital investments…”
The urban transition in Sub-Saharan Africa: implications for economic growth and poverty reduction (2006, background): “Since a large share of the receiving households are in the lowest income decile, their income status improved most dramatically (Adams, 2004).”
Remittances, migration, and social development (2007, background): “In a separate study in Guatemala, Adams (2004) found that the poverty-reducing effect of internal and international remittances was particularly large in relation to the severity of poverty (measured by the squared poverty gap, which considers number, distance and distribution of poor households ben”
Seasonal Migration and Early Childhood Development (2010, background): “…review by Lopez-Cordova and Olmedo (2006) of the literature for Latin America indicates that generally studies have found moderate effects on the poverty head count, but also find that remittances decreases the depth and severity of poverty quite strongly (see also Adams 2004; Adams and Page 2005).”
Migration Remittances and Development: A Review of Global Evidence (2006, background): “Adams (2004a) has found that remittances reduce the severity of poverty in Guatemala.”
Remittances and Poverty in Migrants’ Home Areas: Evidence from the Philippines (2007, methodology): “7Examples of this approach include Adams (1989), Barham and Boucher (1998), and Adams (2004).”