Material deprivation of foreigners in Italy

According to the official Eurostat measure, material deprivation is particularly high among foreigners. But do each deprivation item have the same importance? Are there differences in material deprivation across regions? Is there homogeneity of items’ incidence across regions? In this paper we propose a weighted index of material deprivation (Individual Material Deprivation Index-IMDI) that takes into account the different importance assigned to each of the 9 Eurostat items’ of deprivation in the different geographical areas. We use our weighed index to compare levels of material deprivation of foreign (both in terms of distribution and intensity), to study the differences among nationalities and, to analyze the determinants of material deprivation among foreigners. Given that the distribution of the IMD Index has a strong positive asymmetry with a significant number of zeros (i.e. foreigners without any of the 9 symptoms of deprivation) the statistical analysis is performed using a zero-inflated beta model. All the analysis of the condition of material deprivation of foreigners in Italy are carried on the IT-Silc survey "Reddito e condizioni di vita delle famiglie con stranieri" conducted in 2009 on 6,000 families residing in Italy and having at least one foreigner component.