Poverty Incidence Among Elderly With and Without Pensions in Selected Localities in Ghana

Abstract

This paper assesses poverty incidence of elderly with or without pension in selected localities in Ghana. It adopted monetary measure of poverty using consumption expenditure as poverty index. Structured questionnaire was used to collect data from 332 households’ randomly sampled in 24 enumeration areas across the three ecological belts in the country. Binary logistic regression estimation method was used for the analyses. The finding shows that whereas households with elderly only; elderly and children; as well as elderly and working age had high incidence of poverty; mixed household had low incidence of poverty. With reference to pensions, households with elderly recipients of pension had a significantly low incidence of poverty compared to those without pensions. In order to tackle old age poverty, the study recommends that public policy must target the poorest among the poor in specific household types with elderly without pension.

Keywords: Poverty, Elderly, Ghana, Pension recipient.