Assessing multidimensional poverty of the Italian provinces during Covid-19: a small area estimation approach

The aim of this paper is to analyse the effect of Covid-19 on multidimensional poverty in Italy and its provinces by measuring changes in individual poverty before and during the pandemic outbreak. To capture the multidimensional nature of poverty, we consider different dimensions: economic well-being, health condition, education, neighborhood quality, subjective well-being. The empirical application is based on micro-data from the ‘Aspects of daily life’ (AVQ) survey by Istat for the years 2019 (pre-Covid period) and 2020 (Covid period). Since survey direct estimates are reliable only at regional (NUTS 2) level, the introduction of small area estimation (SAE) techniques becomes of crucial importance to monitor and contrast the phenomenon at a finer geographical level.