Available online at http://www.iorajournal.org/index.php/ijgor/index International Journal of Global Operations Research Vol. 2, No. 4, pp. 124-132, 2021 e-ISSN: 2722-1016 p-ISSN: 2723-1739 Determinants of Poverty in Indonesia: An Empirical Evidence using Panel Data Regression Adhityas Firdaus 1,* , Taufiq C. Dawood 1 , Muhammad Abrar 1 1 Department of Economics, Faculty of Economics and Business, Universitas Syiah Kuala, Darussalam, Banda Aceh, Indonesia *Corresponding author email: firdaus.adhityas@yahoo.com Abstract This study aims to analyze the effect of the rate of economic growth, average length of schooling, dependency ratio, and life expectancy on the percentage of poor people in Indonesia. This study uses panel data consisting of 34 provinces in Indonesia during the period 2016 to 2020. The analysis model used in this study is a panel data regression model. The results found in this study are variables that have a significant effect on the percentage of poor people in Indonesia are the average length of schooling, dependency ratio, and life expectancy. Meanwhile, the variable rate of economic growth has not had a statistically significant effect on the percentage of poor people in Indonesia. The variables of average length of school and life expectancy have a negative and significant effect on the percentage of poor people so that aspects of the quality of human resources represented by the level of education and health have an important role in poverty alleviation. Meanwhile, the dependency ratio has a positive and significant effect on the percentage of the poor, so various policies are needed to control population growth so that the productive population does not have too high a burden to bear the needs of the non-productive population. Keywords: economic growth, average length of schooling, dependency ratio, life expectancy and poor people 1. Introduction Equitable economic development for the sake of equality of welfare is the goal of many regions. This is inseparable from the comprehensive impact of economic development on various social and economic sectors in various circles of society. Good economic development is development that aims to find concrete solutions to macro-problems experienced by people in the region such as poverty (Solikatun et al., 2014). Economic development is closely related to economic growth where economic development will accelerate the rate of economic growth in a region with the aim of reducing inequality as an indicator to be able to state that the perceived welfare is evenly distributed (Firdaus & Witomo, 2014). Each region in Indonesia focuses on equalizing welfare so that the issue of poverty is one of the issues that continues to be resolved. The resulting policies focus on economic development that focuses on improving the quality of human resources such as education and health as well as providing various assistance, both consumptive and productive (Ali et al., 2016). However, these various policies have not been able to reduce the poverty level significantly. This is inseparable from the existence of poverty alleviation programs that are not in accordance with the characteristics of the poor in the region. Various policies have been implemented by the government in order to increase economic growth but can provide more equitable welfare (Maulana et al., 2020). One of the policies that are expected to be able to realize this is the improvement of the quality of human resources in the form of compulsory education policies to policies for providing social assistance, both consumptive and productive. Based on the regulation of the Minister of Finance of the Republic of Indonesia Number 81 of 2012 concerning Social Assistance Expenditures, social assistance expenditures are expenditures that are spent in the form of transfers of money, goods, or services provided by the central or regional government to the community which are intended as protection to the community from all social risks. that occurs, to improve the people's economy, and can provide more equitable welfare. Equitable welfare is based on low levels of poverty and unemployment (Fajriawati, 2016). The characteristics of poverty in each region are different, so the steps that must be taken as a basis for policy making are also different. Indonesia as a very diverse country due to the many tribes and races and cultures makes its