Regional Employment Support Programmes And Multidimensional Poverty of Youth in Turkey

Poverty has been ongoing for many years and still continues to exist in almost all countries around the globe. The objective of alleviating poverty in many nations therefore, remains a significant issue. To comprehend the risks posed by the issue of poverty, its dimension and the process by which it can become deeper must be known, identified and recognised. A broad consensus among policy makers, academic and other institutions is that poverty can be a mixture of various monetary and non-monetary components. These components can limit people’s ability to achieve their potential and affect their well-being. Therefore, the socio-economic growth of a family and of the general welfare of a country should be defined in the combination of both aspects, monetary and non-monetary. The Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) shows how important it is to take into consideration various aspects of poverty. The first aim is to estimate the MPI in Turkey over the period 2006-2015. The second aim is to evaluate the effect of Regional Investment Incentive Scheme implemented in Turkey in 2012. We apply the Differences-in-Differences (DID) framework combined with the Propensity Score Matching (PSM) approach. The results of the study show a significant improvement on wealth, especially in the Eastern part of the country across the period we explore. Furthermore, the findings suggest that the Regional Investment Incentive Scheme had a positive impact on the poverty level in the Eastern part of Turkey, which is the main region of the policy’s interest.