Poverty Odds and Household Expenditure Patterns

This study examined the poverty incidence in Nigeria and investigated the effects of some household expenditure patterns on the odds ratio of poverty majorly. The Harmonized National Living Standard survey (NHLSS 2009) was used in this study while descriptive statistics graphs and ordinary logit model were adopted in the analysis. The empirical evidence from this study showed that about 52.25 percent of Nigeria’s populations are poor. Expenditure patterns of the households decomposed by their socio-economic characteristics: poverty status(poor and non poor) sex(male and female) and sector(rural and urban) revealed that the rural resident households spend more on food while the urban residents spend more on health. The expenditure of the poor is skewed to food consumption while that of the non poor is spread across other expenditure patterns. Likewisefemale-headed households spend more on health while the male-headed households spend more on food. Health and food expenditures are the significant expenditures patterns of the household with other poverty indicators like sector and household size in the model. Recommendations were made based on the empirical evidence from the study.