Dr Wolf Ellis

  • Research Associate (Centre for Research in Social Policy)

Research groups and centres

Publications

Wolf Ellis is a Research Associate in the Centre for Research in Social Policy (CRSP). Wolf has researched living standards, livelihoods and food (in)security in a wide range of contexts, with fieldwork across the UK and in rural and urban areas and refugee camps in the Global South. At CRSP, Wolf’s work includes data collection and analysis for the Minimum Income Standard (MIS), MIS London and Retirement Living Standards research programmes, as well as helping to develop a Decent Living Index to track inflation in the costs of meeting MIS-level needs.

Wolf’s PhD research quantified and contextualised the impacts of food aid for people visiting food banks and community meals in London, and developed new approaches to the measurement of poverty and food insecurity to fill gaps in existing data. The findings make visible a much fuller picture of these people’s livelihoods, demonstrating food aid’s vital sustenance but also its severe limitations.

Previously, he conducted in-depth research in Benin, Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Malawi and Uganda with Evidence for Development, in partnership with many larger organisations such as NGOs, universities, and UNHCR (the UN Refugee Agency), providing detailed analysis of different households’ livelihood components and food security levels to inform the design and monitoring of humanitarian and longer-term development programmes. Wolf has also led a project evaluating potential sources of data for product safety monitoring systems.

Wolf’s research focuses on patterns and implications of living standards and access to food and other resources around the world, and the policies, incomes and other factors that contribute to them. Methodologically, he is interested in the intricacies of people’s experiences and on bringing the data available for research and policy-making closer to real life circumstances, aiming to contribute towards a better understanding of issues of welfare, poverty and inequality.

Wolf carries out both quantitative and qualitative research at CRSP, primarily relating to the Minimum Income Standard (MIS) for income adequacy and various different applications of MIS methods and data.