Welfare and Wealth in Iran: Rural and Urban Dichotomies CURRENT STATUS: POSTED

Objective : Increasing social welfare and reducing poverty are to ensure the well-being of all classes of a society. Cities and villages are distinguished by cultural and economic disparities. The purpose of this study was to develop and present a comprehensive model on welfare and wealth components and their relationship with each other , as well as determining the contributing factors and variables affecting them by presenting a comprehensive model. Results : The Structural Equation Modeling ( SEM ) method was used to analyze the data and investigate the causal relationship of latent variables. Observed variables and latent variables of the model were analyzed and tested by using AMOS and SPSS (version 21) statistical methods, in two exploratory and confirmatory steps. Wealth and welfare were identified as two separate subjects in the conceptual model and in the final structural model for rural households. Unlike, in the urban community, they were recognized as a single category in the final structural model. The results of this study can provide the clear hints for effective policy making to break the cycle of deprivation and poverty in Iranian rural and urban population.


Introduction
Increasing social welfare and reducing poverty are among the main goals of any country's economic developmental plans. One of the main tasks of rulers and economic policy makers is to ensure the well-being of all classes in a society (1).
Generally, welfare is defined as the governmental support for the citizens of a society and that includes all members regardless of level of income. Accommodating basic needs for all society members is the least aim in social welfare. These needs include food, housing, literacy, health and employment opportunities for all citizens (2).
It should be noted that wealth, in general, is considered as one of the influencing factors in promoting the level of family welfare. Although wealth and welfare state completely two different meanings, most economists believe that there is a positive relationship between them.
In general, experts believe that production of wealth includes (3): Access to income generating opportunities Income generating capabilities Security for income generation Power Cities and villages, in addition to complex dialectical relationships, are distinguished by cultural and economic disparities. The fact is that, from the economic point of view, rural dwellers earn higher income than residents living in urban areas. This difference is less noticeable in developed countries than in less-developed nations (4). According to most researchers and experts, the development of agricultural industry is recognized as the main economic lever for rural households. Accordingly, land is regarded as the vital economic resource (5).
Francis Gardes, in his study of poverty, inequality and income mobility in Ecuador, concluded that despite the decline in poverty rates during the years 2000-2009, yet, there is a noticeable difference between rural and urban areas (6).
Many developing countries, including Iran, are now facing the widespread inequalities between rural and urban environments. Based upon the findings of Khalaj et al. in Iran the number of poor households in rural areas is more than urban households (7). Another study showed that income distribution in rural areas of Iran is more volatile and unbalanced than urban areas (8).
The Government of Islamic Republic of Iran has taken numerous measures to implement social justice in the country. For example, we can refer to the formulation of the "Economic Organizing Plan" in 1998 and establishing the Ministry of Welfare and Social Security in 2004(9, 10).Another study has shown that despite of increasing convergence of Iran's economy towards the world economy that reduced the poverty gap among urban households, it presented unpleasing effects on rural areas (11). This is indicative of the fact that the concepts used in the international context are not necessarily generalizable to all countries.
Unfortunately, in Rural Areas of Iran, the less productive traditional agriculture is more prevalent. Therefore, it seems that increasing productivity should be considered as one of the important targets for elimination of deprivation and poverty in rural communities (12). The SEM method is a new statistical tool that in addition to current statistical methods, provides the possibility to measure the error estimation of observable and latent variables, modifying a predictive model based on conceptual framework, the most appropriate statistical method for our model (15). Analysis was done by using AMOS and

A: Rural Data
Findings from Exploratory Factor Analysis for welfare components in rural data from Conceptual Research Model in 3 fields: appropriate nutrition, appropriate home appliance, appropriate housing were approved with values greater than 0.4. However, in the first and second Confirmatory Factor Analysis in the AMOS software, two welfare components in the home appliance section, dishwasher and microwave variables, with factor loads of 0.23 and 0.15, respectively, and one welfare components in the housing section, type of home variable, with a factor load of 0.19 (less than 30%) were not confirmed and therefore were removed from the conceptual model.
All factor loadings were significant. (P-value≤0.001) As the model fit indices were at appropriate levels, the conceptual model of the research was therefore confirmed with respect to most of the principal component variables.
In the initial conceptual model of the factors leading to wealth production, education wasn't an effective factor in job creation (0.15) and it did not have a significant impact on income generation (0.01). (P-value≤0.001) As a result, educational level was not a causative factor in creation of an effective job for income generation in rural households.
However, education, occupation, household size, and income were confirmed as impact   The present study showed that the economic structure of rural society is quite different from that of urban society. It was found that in rural society, wealth is the source of welfare. Therefore, in a rural community, a family with higher wealth earns higher income, affords higher education, and access to better job opportunity. In the past, it was believed that when it comes to labor force, the number of children was referred to as the cheapest employee. This has been confirmed in other societies in Egypt and the Ivory Coast (16,17).
The results of this study showed that the urban community structure is in accordance with the presented welfare and wealth model. It is therefore logical that in urban society in order to design poverty alleviation policies, it is better to invest in prerequisites for income generation, such as education. As such, in the countryside, policy makers should seek measures to consolidate land ownership policies rather than advocating education.
However, as a key asset, land plays a pivotal role in gaining interest and equity in rural households. The results of Ferreira's study on poverty and inequality in Tanzania also confirmed human capital, land and livestock as the most important assets of rural households (18).
The UK Department for International Development believes that land is a safe and secure livelihood asset for villagers. It should be noted that land is a necessary, but not always an absolute condition for poverty alleviation (19). Another study conducted in Asian rural areas shows that rural poverty usually has an inverse relationship with the size of arable land (20). Another study in Java confirms that access to land is closely linked to access to capital, as well (21).
It should be noted here that Article 30 and Article 31 of Iran constitution, which requires free education in the country, will not necessarily contribute to poverty alleviation in rural areas. A national study on the distribution and severity of poverty concluded that poverty is a multidimensional epidemic problem in rural areas. It also indicated that housing and education are two variables that play a significant role in its establishment (22). But with some results of the conceptual model presented in this study, it seems that in this country, a serious revision is needed to prioritize the land ownership policies to educational policies, in the countryside. Obviously, this does not imply that state capitalism is a successful economic solution in rural society. Another theory is that the advent of technology in the agricultural industry will increase the productivity. At the same time, this increase will be even more effective if combined with land ownership.
Another indicator is inequality that has been linked to poverty and has a destructive role on it. This is an indicator of the disproportionate distribution of ownership resources for farmers. A report on poverty and inequality in Iran in 2016 showed an upward trend on both indicators, while inequality rate slightly overtook the poverty (23).
Another indicator jeopardizing income of the villagers is inflation. Unfortunately, the villagers are the main victims of unbridled inflation in the societies. In addition, lack of social support can exacerbate this vulnerability phenomenon (24). It should be emphasized that governments have a definitive role in adoption of more equitable and targeted policies for the allocation and distribution of resources. Eventually, in order to increase the welfare of these communities, these policies should be oriented in such a way that control inflation.
This study emphasized that land ownership in the village has the clear priority, as opposed to of education in the city. It is worth mentioning that poverty deprivation policies should be based on the facilitation of land ownership in the country's macroeconomics plans. Nevertheless, in urban areas, wealth and welfare are the two simultaneously dimensions of the urban economics.

Limitations
Given that we used the national available data, We did not have direct control over the validity of the data.

Declarations
Authors' contributions Shafiei, Sediqe, was the main operator of the study; Yazdani, Shahram designed the study and monitored all steps of the study; Zafarmand, A. Hamid monitored all steps of the study, and prepared and edited the manuscript; Jadidfard, Mohammad-Pooyan was the codesigner; Shakerian, Sareh designed and monitored all steps of the study, and finalized the manuscript. All authors read and approved the manuscript.
Sciences School of Dentistry.

Competing interests
The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Consent to publish
Not applicable.

Availability of data and materials
The data that support the findings of this study are available from Statistical Center of Iran(NSCI)https://www.amar.org.ir/english publicly available. Data are however available from the authors.
Ethics approval and consent to participate The final model of rural data in standard coefficient estimation model