Morten Jerven on Measuring African Poverty and Progress

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4.7 • 4.4K Ratings

🗓️ 7 January 2013

⏱️ 69 minutes

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Summary

Morten Jerven of Simon Fraser University, author of Poor Numbers, talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the quality of data coming out of Africa on income, growth, and population. Jerven argues that the inconsistency of the numbers and methodology both across countries and within a country across time, makes many empirical studies of African progress meaningless. The conversation closes with a discussion of what might be done to improve data collection in poor countries.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to Econ Talk, part of the Library of Economics and Liberty.
0:06.4	I'm your host, Russ Roberts of Stanford University's Hoover Institution.
0:11.0	Our website is econtalk.org where you can subscribe, comment on this podcast, and find links
0:16.3	and other information related to today's conversation.
0:19.0	You'll also find our archives where you can listen to every episode we've ever done going
0:23.3	back to 2006.
0:25.4	Our email address is mailadycontalk.org.
0:27.9	We'd love to hear from you.
0:33.1	Today is December 19, 2012, and my guest is Morton Jerven of Simon Fraser University
0:39.2	and the author of Poor Numbers, How We Are Missled by African Development Statistics,
0:45.6	and What To Do About It, which will be published this spring.
0:48.5	Morton, welcome to Econ Talk.
0:50.4	Thank you very much, Russ.
0:51.9	Before we begin, I want to mention this is scheduled to be the first release of
0:54.9	2013, which means that 2012 was over by the time you hear this, and I'd like to get
1:01.1	some feedback from you out there in the listening audience.
1:04.6	Please send me an email listing your three favorite episodes of econtalk for 2012.
1:09.2	You can find all the 2012 episodes as well as all of our previous episodes going back
1:14.8	to 2006 at econtalk.org.
1:18.5	Just look at the menu on the left hand side of the page and you'll see the archive there
1:22.1	organized by date, category, or featured guest, so look up 2012's podcasts and send me
1:29.7	an email at mailatekontalk.org and then the subject line, Save Favorites, and give
	...

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