Resumen
In Vietnam, poverty is a serious socio-economic issue in need of addressing, especially as the speed of decrease in the poverty rate is narrowing and the rich-poor gap is increasing. The empirical study focuses on examining the key factors at the household-level that affect the living standards of households. In this study, two multiple linear regression models are used to determine the impacts of variables related to the household characteristics, main jobs of heads, and the access of public services on monthly per capita expenditure of the poor and non-poor based on the data from the Vietnam Household Living Standards Survey 2010. The results obtained from the analysis indicate that households in the rural areas and ethnic minorities are poorer. Likewise, households with larger family size, higher dependent rate and smaller working member proportion are poorer. In contrast, households with heads having higher levels of educational and vocational qualifications and households with easier access to the water and electricity sources have higher PCE. Finally, expenditure per capita is also affected by employment sector because non-agricultural jobs bring higher income for households than the income generated by agricultural activities.