Who is poor? And what is poverty?

[Darat]

There have been a few threads in which measures of poverty and the number of poor people have been touched upon.

I thought I'd start a thread to discuss what should be or is the definition of poverty.

In my view I think there are really two types of poverty, the first being a more objective measure and the second being a relative measure.

For me the first definition of "poverty" is when a person does not have all of the following ( and not from choice):

Housing e.g. safe, dry, warm/cool with some privacy and clean, safe water (hot & cold)
Adequate sanitation
Lighting for home
Bed/chair et cetera
Adequate food and means to prepare and store food
Adequate clothing e.g. coat for cold weather
Access to local areas (e.g. can use local transport to a certain degree)
Access to communication (e.g. post)


(I am ignoring such things as access to legal representation, education and medical treatment as my assumption is that these will be available to all in any humane society. )

And I think that is it. Now of course some of the above may require an amount of money so income may have a bearing on someone being described as poor but would not be the determining factor.

Now under this I would suggest that the poverty figures would look very different, for most “developed” states then the current ones that are based primarily on income.

However I do think there is room for a second definition and use of poverty and that is a "relative poverty", which would try to calculate what the "average" citizen has access to and compare everyone against these expectations. It could then be that the "bottom" 10% of a society don't have the means to acquire a TV set so could be said to be "poor in comparison to the rest of society" or that their income is “90% lower” then the average therefore they live in “relative poverty”.

Please feel free to tear into my opinions.

 

[DialecticMaterialist]

I'm not sure if this is so much a matter of strict category so much as an approximation based on a comparative standard. With the standard being more or less narrow with the situation of course.

 

[The Don]

Definition of child poverty is:

New Labour has defined child poverty as any child living in a household with below 60% of average income after housing.

From this article:

http://society.guardian.co.uk/socialexclusion/story/0,11499,687400,00.html

In Ireland there was a change to include a "material deprivation" clause:

This incorporated the number of people with below 60% of average income and material deprivation

Whereas they used to use a 50% of average income measure

Under the new measure poverty is 6% rather than 26% as before.

As I mentioned in an earlier thread, under the UK rules I am poor because I'm electing to take a nominal salary from my business this year. If this is the case, where are my damn handouts? I wanna Bentley and a castle and a roomfull of chocolate and a pony!

 

[MRC_Hans]

I think poverty is very relative. In some parts of the world, a family that eats every day, sleeps under a roof, and can wear enough clothes for decency, will not be considered, or consider themselves, poor (think e.g amazon indians).

In New York, this family would certainly be considered poor.

Climate is also a factor. Obviously, if you live in a climate where heating is sometimes required and where food has to be bought because you cannot live off the surrounding land, poverty is different.

Hans

 

[Ed]

What about when poverty is choosen?

 

[Jon_in_london]

What about when poverty is choosen?

Pls explain who chooses poverty, examples etc...

 

[MRC_Hans]

Monks and nuns come to mind. Other people choosing the live a simple lifestyle, what is the name of that American sect with the little horse-carts?

Hans

 

[Cain]

We have a really odd way of calculating poverty in the United States. The government calculates what percentage of your income you spend on food. If it's more than a third (I believe) then you're poor.

Everyone, including the woman who devised the system, agrees it's wrong. Nobody wants to change it because a more accurate calculation might see a "jump" in poverty of four million people. It's just not politically savvy.

 

[Ed]

Pls explain who chooses poverty, examples etc...

There are people in NYC, some of whom are mentally ill (they were let out of MH facilities years ago because of a suit by the ACLU, as I recall) some of whom are, presumably, not. They don't want to be enumerated (some "enumerators tried to find some homeless people in NY last year, big media event, they came up with only a handful). There was also a big article on these folks in some damn magazine that I can't recall over the last year or two. Point is that they, some at least, have simply dropped out, live in fleabag hotels, scrounge food and so on and want it that way. I did not say like, I said want. In less PC and more agrarian days they were called hobos.

I guess that there are still hippies that have dropped out and live in communial communities.

I guess that to those who believe in free drug availability to all, homeless addicts have made a choice and continue to do so. I think, personally, that once a pewrson is addicted there is no choice which is why I favor some drug laws.

 

[Ed]

Monks and nuns come to mind. Other people choosing the live a simple lifestyle, what is the name of that American sect with the little horse-carts?

Hans

Mennonites. There might be other sects too. Also I recall reading that the ultra orthodox jews are not particularly well off.

 

[Michael Redman]

One thing I associate with poverty is being in the financial position that a short term illness preventing you from working will force you into insolvency and homelessness because you have no savings and no credit to borrow against.

I wouldn't necessarily call Mennonites or Amish poor. If you own a farm and a house (outright, no mortgages) and the animals and equipment necessary to be productive, I think you're pretty well off, even if you don't have modern material luxuries, or a large cash income.

 

[aerocontrols]

Something that people often get wrong when thinking about relative wealth in our society. (I've commented on this twice in the last couple of weeks here, it seems)

Income and wealth are two different things. If you make $250k/year and you spend $280k/year, you will not accumulate wealth. If you make $20k/year and you spend $15k/year then you will accumulate wealth.

People often throw around words like 'poor' without specifying what they mean.

My grandparents are retired, and thus have a very low income. However, they have a large retirement account, and they own their home and vehicle outright. If they wanted to draw down on their retirement faster, they could choose to do so, but increasing their income in that manner would not make them any 'richer', in fact, it would make them 'poorer', wouldn't it? If one chooses to measure their income to determine if they could afford to (for example) pay for medication, they will quite wrongly determine that my grandparents cannot afford to do so. (Retired folks are another group that often 'chooses' to be poor, at least when poverty is measured by income - another example for Jon_in_London.)

Just a warning to be careful when citing figures about 'wealth' and 'income'...

I think poverty should be measured with a formula that would take into account the amount of money one could withdraw from assets one owns if one had to do so over their expected life span, while also taking into account the willingness of high-income earners to spend 115% of what they make every year. There are a lot of numerically 'poor' people who should not be included when we discuss how to solve the problem of poverty.

Edit to add that regional considerations matter, too. It's certainly a lot easier to live off of minimum wage in Kansas than it is to do so here in Atlanta, for instance...

MattJ