Measuring Living Standards

Living Standards (LS) refer to households’ level of access to goods, services and recreational activities. Assessments of LS vary in how they set the thresholds that define a certain standard of living and how they measure who achieves these thresholds. This POSTnote outlines different approaches to setting and measuring thresholds and their strengths and limitations. It also summarises research on recent trends in living standards and the key factors that influence them.