ABSTRACT

This study has investigated the work behavior of the world’s poor, a significant percentage of the world’s population, who work long hard hours but live below their subsistence standard of living as the return to their labor is very low, and therefore, are justifiably called the ‘working poor’ (Thorbecke, 1973). The evidence on the behavior existing in the literature is reviewed, current theoretical explanations are evaluated, a generalized utility function framework is proposed to analyze it, a supply function consistent with the conventional micro-theoretic formulation and relevant to the behavior is derived, logical explanations for hitherto unexplained empirical phenomena is provided using this derived function, and important policy implications are suggested.