Multidimensional Poverty and Natural Disasters in Argentina (1970–2010)

Abstract

This paper studies the effect of multiple natural disasters occurred in the different districts of Argentina between 1970 and 2010 on their multidimensional poverty, as measured by a Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) comprising five core dimensions of well-being: housing, basic services, standard of living, education and employment. The paper uses household microdata of the last census, and natural disasters registry from the DesInventar database. We find that natural disasters significantly increase the MPI and, while the magnitude of the impact found is moderate, effects are persistent, especially in dimensions related to infrastructure and long-term investments. We find that on average, extensive disasters are more harmful than intensive ones, although the latter do have significant impacts on sanitation infrastructure. We also find that hydrological disasters are the ones with significant impact. Finally, natural disasters have greater effect on the poorer districts of the country, corresponding to the northeast region.