CONEVAL Presents 30 Year Analysis of Inequalities

CONEVAL has released a report exploring how social inequities have evolved through the last 30 years. The purpose of this report is to provide an overview of the country's social panorama, taking into account the diverse demographic, social, economic and political transformations the country has undergone.

The estimates presented show the panorama of social development before the COVID-19 pandemic. Between 1990 and 2020, there was an improvement in all the estimated indicators of social deprivation both nationally and by state. The study is based on data collected by INEGI’s Population and Housing Censuses and data from intercensal polls and surveys. The document aims to explore the trends of multidimensional poverty indicators through the changes in education, housing quality, essential services provision in homes and access to health services.

The study of these indicators takes on particular relevance because they show the reality of people’s lives and the conditions they face on a daily basis that will end up impacting their health. While it is easy to generate a direct relationship between health and access to health services, this is not so obvious in the case of other indicators. As an example, the quality of the walls in homes can be a risk factor for infectious diseases such as Chagas.

In the period studied, there was a decrease in educational lagging, with a reduction of 9.3 percent at the national level, falling from 26.6 percent to 17.3 percent. The states with the highest educative lag were Chiapas, Oaxaca and Michoacan, while those with the lowest percentages were Mexico City, Nuevo Leon and Coahuila.

The study of deprivation due to housing quality was classified in terms of overcrowding and quality of floors, walls and ceilings. Overcrowded housing decreased by 20.4 percent, from 28.7 percent to 8.3 percent. On the other hand, the population living with poor quality floors, ceilings and walls decreased by 17.6, 11.4 and 6.1 percentage points, respectively. An important observation is that Baja California and Mexico City saw an increase in overcrowding, although they remain below the national average.

The report also measured the lack of access to basic services in housing, including changes in the provision of piped water, drainage and electricity. The reduction in the number of homes lacking access to piped water was 20.4 percent, lacking drainage was 34.3 percent and lacking electricity was 12.5 percent. An essential aspect of these metrics is that they only show access in a dichotomous manner and do not necessarily reflect the permanence or quality of the service. For example, a household may have access to piped water services but receive service less than half of the day.

Because the 1990 census does not have information on health services, in this area the period covered by the study consisted of 2000-2020. During this period, the lack of access to health services decreased nationally by 37.2 percentage points, from 58.6 percent to 21.5 percent. However, from 2015 to 2020 an increase of 4.8 percent was observed in this indicator. The entities that presented the lowest percentage of deprivation to health services were Baja California Sur, Chihuahua and Colima. On the other hand, the entities with the highest deprivation of health services were Chiapas, the State of Mexico and Michoacan, where a third of the population does not have access to health services.