食品与卡路里的支出弹性：来自肯尼亚无条件现金转移的证据
The Expenditure Elasticity for Food and Calories: Evidence from Unconditional Cash Transfers in Kenya
Journal of Development Economics · 2025 · [{"name": "Ingvild Almås", "affiliation": ["Stockholm University"]}, {"name": "Johannes Haushofer", "affiliation": ["Cornell University"]}, {"name": "Anders Kjelsrud", "affiliation": ["Metropolitan University"]}]
中文摘要
准确的食品与营养弹性估计,是设计面向贫困群体的高效政策的重要依据。本文利用肯尼亚农村两个无条件现金转移项目带来的外生预算变动,结合食品支出、营养与价格的详细数据,估计了食品与卡路里的支出弹性。我们发现,食品支出弹性为0.86,卡路里弹性为0.66。尽管这些估计值高于许多既有研究报告的结果——这可能是因为本研究聚焦于极端贫困家庭——但显著低于在同一情境下采用非实验分析所得的估计值。
Abstract
Accurate estimates of food and nutrient elasticities are important inputs for the design of efficient policies targeting the poor. In this paper we estimate the expenditure elasticity of food and calories using exogenous variation in budget from two unconditional cash transfer programs in rural Kenya, combined with detailed data on food expenditure, nutrition and prices. We find an elasticity of food expenditure of 0.86 and of calories of 0.66. Although these estimates are higher than those reported in many previous studies — plausibly because our study focuses on extremely poor households — they are significantly lower than those obtained using a non-experimental analysis in our context.