How Poor Are People With Disabilities? Evidence Based on the Global Multidimensional Poverty Index

Abstract

People with disabilities and their families have been recognized as a high-risk population for poverty. Although the number of studies analyzing the levels of poverty of this group has increased, there is still a lack of empirical evidence that establishes whether and how people with disabilities are significantly poorer than families with no disabled members. This study analyses the levels of multidimensional poverty of people living in households with members with disabilities in 11 low- and middle-income countries in different regions of the world, using the global Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI). The results reveal that in five of the 11 countries people living in households with disabled members face higher levels of multidimensional poverty compared with people without disabilities. In addition, we found that differences between the levels of poverty were larger in middle-income countries than in low-income countries, revealing the existence of a development disability gap.