PALESTINIAN SOCIETY - Fafo

Religious affiliation was considered of minor importance as
reference variable forthe distribution ofhousehold economic resourc�
es in the occupied territories. First, the area is almost exc1usively
Moslem, (96%). Second, apossible correlation between religion and
household wealth has more academic interest than policy relevance.
Apparently, Christian households have much higher scores on
household wealth than Moslem households. 90% of the Christian
population in the occupied territories, however, live in the high wealth
score areas of Central West Bank and Arab Jerusalem, while virtually
no Christians live in low score Gaza.
Household Wealth
and Household Composition
"With every mouth comes a pair of hands". This saying indicates the
dual effect of household size on economic resources. On average it
seems reasonable to assume that the more household members there
are, the higher the household income, but also the household expenditure.
In the introduction it was asserted that the ability of a household
to generate wealth depends on the size of the income which remains
after daily consumption expenditures like food and c10thing have been
subtracted. Investigation of the correlation between household size
and household wealth should thus give a more correct picture of the
possible effect of household size on household economic resources
than the correlation between household size and household income.
In particular, a high number of adult men in the household could
be expected to increase household wealth, because most men receive
income from labour activity. A high number of children, on the other
hand, could be expected to increase household expendifures more
than household income.
What, then, is the correlation between household size and wealth?
Because the number of adult males, adult females and children in a
household are highly correlated it is difficult to isolate the effeet of
each group. Household wealth, however, c1early seems to increase
with the number of adult males in the household, but this relation is
weaker in Gaza than in the other regions.
A high number of children, on the contrary, seems to affect
household wealth somewhat negatively. The negative effect of a high
number of children on household\vealth is weaker in the three regions
taken separately than for the occupied territories in total. This result
is partially a consequence of the high average number of children in
low wealth Gaza.
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