Abstract
It has in the past been difficult for Australian policy-makers and researchers to assess the extent of poverty, wealth and income inequality
at a small-area level. This chapter reports on NATSEM’s (National
Centre for Social and Economic Modelling) pathbreaking work to
create synthetic small-area socio-demographic data and construct microsimulation models capable of predicting the regional impact of policy
change on top of this synthetic base data – hereafter ‘‘spatial microsimulation’’.
The first section of the chapter describes the main sources of sociodemographic data currently available and the limitations of the data.
The second section describes spatial microsimulation and introduces
the major methods of creating synthetic microdata. The spatial microsimulation approach currently being developed by NATSEM, known as
SYNAGI (Synthetic Australian Geo-demographic Information) is then
described. The third section describes the policy option modelled, examines estimated national poverty rates in Australia in 2001 and looks at
the change in poverty due to the policy change simulated. As an illustrative example of the capacities of the new model, the fourth section
examines the likely regional distributional impact of this possible policy
change and looks at the poverty profile of one postcode. The final section
concludes
at a small-area level. This chapter reports on NATSEM’s (National
Centre for Social and Economic Modelling) pathbreaking work to
create synthetic small-area socio-demographic data and construct microsimulation models capable of predicting the regional impact of policy
change on top of this synthetic base data – hereafter ‘‘spatial microsimulation’’.
The first section of the chapter describes the main sources of sociodemographic data currently available and the limitations of the data.
The second section describes spatial microsimulation and introduces
the major methods of creating synthetic microdata. The spatial microsimulation approach currently being developed by NATSEM, known as
SYNAGI (Synthetic Australian Geo-demographic Information) is then
described. The third section describes the policy option modelled, examines estimated national poverty rates in Australia in 2001 and looks at
the change in poverty due to the policy change simulated. As an illustrative example of the capacities of the new model, the fourth section
examines the likely regional distributional impact of this possible policy
change and looks at the poverty profile of one postcode. The final section
concludes
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Title of host publication | Understanding Human Well-Being |
| Editors | Mark McGillivray, Matthew Clarke |
| Place of Publication | Tokyo |
| Publisher | United Nations University Press |
| Pages | 239-261 |
| Number of pages | 23 |
| ISBN (Print) | 9789280811308 |
| Publication status | Published - 2006 |
