基于主观福利评价思路估计中国家户等价规模——一种准确比较家户生活水准的应用工具

An Estimate of Chinese Household Equivalence Scales Based on a Subjective Well-being Assessment Approach:An Application Tool for Comparing the Standard of Living Accurately

家户等价规模反映了不同规模和年龄结构组成家户与参照家户获得相同消费福利时,所需必要消费的换算比例。因此,在比较这些家户的个体生活水准时,常使用家户等价规模来进行调整,以便能够精确识别贫困人口,准确评估贫困和不平等程度。本文使用中国健康与养老追踪调查2013年数据,基于主观福利评价的思路,估计了不同规模和年龄结构组成家户的等价成人规模。在仅考虑家户人口规模时,城镇家户的规模经济系数为0.751,农村家户为0.647,表明城镇家庭消费支出的规模经济程度低于农村家户,体现了不同的消费特征。而在加入家庭成员年龄结构的影响后,得到成年人计算等价成人规模的折算系数为0.389,未成年人为0.521,体现了家户中成年人和未成年人各自的生活成本。这些估计参数可供政策制定者及研究者在进行家户间生活水准比较以及扶贫援助项目时予以参考。

Household equivalence scale is a scale that is used to calculate necessary consumption for the household composed by different size and age structure members so that their welfare is equal to that of reference household.When comparing the living standard of individuals living under different households which are constituted by different household scales and age structure,household equivalence scales is used to adjust them so as to identify the poor,evaluate the poverty and inequality exactly.This paper uses data from China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study in 2013 to estimate household equivalence scales based on subjective living standard assessment approach.The results show that the economies of scale elasticity is 0.751 in urban area and 0.647 in rural area if we only consider the impact of household size.It means that the degree of economies of scale in household expenditure in urban area is lower than that in rural areas,which shows different consumption types.After considering the impact of the age structure of household members,the results show that the second and more adults are calculated as 0.389 equivalent adult and a child is calculated as 0.521 equivalent adult.It shows different living costs for adults and children.These parameters can be applied to compare the household welfare level,and determine amount of aid for poverty alleviation programs.