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Poverty

2007 Schools Wikipedia Selection. Related subjects: Animal & Human Rights;
Culture and Diversity

   A boy from an East Cipinang trash dump slum in Jakarta, Indonesia shows
   what he found.
   A boy from an East Cipinang trash dump slum in Jakarta, Indonesia shows
   what he found.

   Poverty is a condition in which a person or community is deprived of,
   and or lacks the essentials for a minimum standard of well-being and
   life. Since poverty is understood in many senses, these essentials may
   be material resources such as food, safe drinking water, and shelter,
   or they may be social resources such as access to information,
   education, health care, social status, political power, or the
   opportunity to develop meaningful connections with other people in
   society.

   Poverty may also be defined in relative terms. In this view income
   disparities or wealth disparities are seen as an indicator of poverty
   and the condition of poverty is linked to questions of scarcity and
   distribution of resources and power.

   Poverty may be defined by a government or organization for legal
   purposes, see Poverty threshold.

   Poverty may be seen as the collective condition of poor people, or of
   poor groups, and in this sense entire nation-states are sometimes
   regarded as poor. A more neutral term is developing nations. Although
   the most severe poverty is in the developing world, there is evidence
   of poverty in every region. In developed countries examples include
   homeless people and ghettos.

   Poverty is also a type of religious vow, a state that may be taken on
   voluntarily in keeping with practices of piety.

Measuring poverty

   Map of world poverty by country, showing percentage of population
   living on less than 1 dollar per day. Unfortunately, information is
   missing for some countries.
   Map of world poverty by country, showing percentage of population
   living on less than 1 dollar per day. Unfortunately, information is
   missing for some countries.
   World map showing Life expectancy.
   World map showing Life expectancy.
   World map showing the Human Development Index.
   World map showing the Human Development Index.
   World map showing the Gini coefficient, a measure of income inequality.
   World map showing the Gini coefficient, a measure of income inequality.
   The percentage of the world's population living on less than $1 per day
   has halved in twenty years. However, most of this improvement has
   occurred in East and South Asia. The graph shows the 1981-2001 period.
   The percentage of the world's population living on less than $1 per day
   has halved in twenty years. However, most of this improvement has
   occurred in East and South Asia. The graph shows the 1981-2001 period.
   Life expectancy has been increasing and converging for most of the
   world. Sub-Saharan Africa has recently seen a decline, partly related
   to the AIDS epidemic. The graph shows the 1950-2005 period.
   Life expectancy has been increasing and converging for most of the
   world. Sub-Saharan Africa has recently seen a decline, partly related
   to the AIDS epidemic. The graph shows the 1950-2005 period.
   A homeless Frenchman in Paris.
   A homeless Frenchman in Paris.

   When measured, poverty may be absolute or relative poverty. Absolute
   poverty refers to a set standard which is consistent over time and
   between countries. An example of an absolute measurement would be the
   percentage of the population eating less food than is required to
   sustain the human body (approximately 2000-2500 calories per day for an
   adult male).

   The World Bank defines extreme poverty as living on less than US$ (
   PPP) 1 per day, and moderate poverty as less than $2 a day. It has been
   estimated that in 2001, 1.1 billion people had consumption levels below
   $1 a day and 2.7 billion lived on less than $2 a day. The proportion of
   the developing world's population living in extreme economic poverty
   has fallen from 28 percent in 1990 to 21 percent in 2001. Much of the
   improvement has occurred in East and South Asia. In Sub-Saharan Africa
   GDP/capita shrank with 14 percent and extreme poverty increased from 41
   percent in 1981 to 46 percent in 2001. Other regions have seen little
   or no change. In the early 1990s the transition economies of Europe and
   Central Asia experienced a sharp drop in income. Poverty rates rose to
   6 percent at the end of the decade before beginning to recede. There
   are various criticisms of these measurements.

   Other indicators are also improving. Life expectancy has greatly
   increased in the developing world since WWII and is starting to close
   the gap to the developed world where the improvement has been smaller.
   Even in Sub-Saharan Africa, the least developed region, life expectancy
   increased from 30 years before World War II to a peak of about 50 years
   before the HIV pandemic and other diseases started to force it down to
   the current level of 47 years. Child mortality has decreased in every
   developing region of the world. The proportion of the world's
   population living in countries where per-capita food supplies are less
   than 2,200 calories (9,200 kilojoules) per day decreased from 56% in
   the mid-1960s to below 10% by the 1990s. Between 1950 and 1999, global
   literacy increased from 52% to 81% of the world. Women made up much of
   the gap: Female literacy as a percentage of male literacy has increased
   from 59% in 1970 to 80% in 2000. The percentage of children not in the
   labor force has also risen to over 90% in 2000 from 76% in 1960. There
   are similar trends for electric power, cars, radios, and telephones per
   capita, as well as the proportion of the population with access to
   clean water.

   Relative poverty views poverty as socially defined and dependent on
   social context. In this case, the number of people counted as poor
   could increase while their income rise. A relative measurement would be
   to compare the total wealth of the poorest one-third of the population
   with the total wealth of richest 1% of the population. There are
   several different income inequality metrics. One example is the Gini
   coefficient.

   In many developed countries the official definition of poverty used for
   statistical purposes is based on relative income. As such many critics
   argue that poverty statistics measure inequality rather than material
   deprivation or hardship. For instance, according to the U.S. Census
   Bureau, 46% of those in "poverty" in the U.S. own their own home (with
   the average poor person's home having three bedrooms, with one and a
   half baths, and a garage). Furthermore, the measurements are usually
   based on a person's yearly income and frequently take no account of
   total wealth. The main poverty line used in the OECD and the European
   Union is based on "economic distance", a level of income set at 50% of
   the median household income. The US poverty line is more arbitrary. It
   was created in 1963-64 and was based on the dollar costs of the U.S.
   Department of Agriculture's "economy food plan" multiplied by a factor
   of three. The multiplier was based on research showing that food costs
   then accounted for about one third of the total money income. This
   one-time calculation has since been annually updated for inflation.

   Income inequality for the world as a whole is diminishing. A 2002 study
   by Xavier Sala-i-Martin finds that this is driven mainly, but not
   fully, by the extraordinary growth rate of the incomes of the 1.2
   billion Chinese citizens. However, unless Africa achieve economic
   growth, then China, India, the OECD and the rest of middle-income and
   rich countries will diverge away from it, and global inequality will
   rise. Thus, the economic growth of the African continent should be the
   priority of anyone concerned with increasing global income inequality.

   Even if poverty may be lessening for the world as a whole, it continues
   to be an enormous problem:
     * One third of deaths - some 18 million people a year or 50,000 per
       day - are due to poverty-related causes. That's 270 million people
       since 1990, the majority women and children, roughly equal to the
       population of the US.
     * Every year nearly 11 million children die before their fifth
       birthday.

     * In 2001, 1.1 billion people had consumption levels below $1 a day
       and 2.7 billion lived on less than $2 a day

     * 800 million people go to bed hungry every day.

   The World Bank's "Voices of the Poor" , based on research with over
   20,000 poor people in 23 countries, identifies a range of factors which
   poor people consider elements of poverty. Most important are those
   necessary for material well-being, especially food. Many others relate
   to social rather than material issues.
     * precarious livelihoods
     * excluded locations
     * gender relationships
     * problems in social relationships
     * lack of security
     * abuse by those in power
     * dis-empowering institutions
     * limited capabilities, and
     * weak community organizations.

Causes of poverty

   Many different factors have been cited to explain why poverty occurs.
   However, no single explanation has gained universal acceptance. Some
   possible factors include:
     * Natural factors such as the climate or environment
     * Geographic factors, for example access to fertile land, fresh
       water, minerals, energy, and other natural resources. Presence or
       absence of natural features helping or limiting communication, such
       mountains, deserts, sailable rivers, or coastline. Historically,
       geography has prevented or slowed the spread of new technology to
       areas such as the Americas and Sub-Saharan Africa. The climate also
       limits what crops and farm animals may be used on similarly fertile
       lands.
     * On the other hand, research on the resource curse has found that
       countries with an abundance of natural resources creating quick
       wealth from exports tend to have less long-term prosperity than
       countries with less of these natural resources.
     * Inadequate nutrition in childhood in poor nations may lead to
       physical and mental stunting that, in turn, may lead to economic
       problems. (Hence, it is both a cause and an effect). For example,
       lack of both iodine and iron has been implicated in impaired brain
       development, and this can affect enormous numbers of people: it is
       estimated that 2 billion people (one-third of the total global
       population) are affected by iodine deficiency, including 285
       million 6- to 12-year-old children. In developing countries, it is
       estimated that 40% of children aged 4 and under suffer from anaemia
       because of insufficient iron in their diets. See also Health and
       intelligence.
     * Disease, specifically diseases of poverty: AIDS, malaria, and
       tuberculosis and others overwhelmingly afflict developing nations,
       which perpetuate poverty by diverting individual, community, and
       national health and economic resources from investment and
       productivity. Further, many tropical nations are affected by
       parasites like malaria, schistosomiasis, and trypanosomiasis that
       are not present in temperate climates. The Tsetse fly makes it very
       difficult to use many animals in agriculture in afflicted regions.
     * Poverty itself, prevents (for example) various forms of investment
     * Inability to find a well-paying job (see working poor)
     * Unemployment and/or underemployment
     * Globalization, too much or too little.
     * Lacking rule of law.
     * Lacking democracy.
     * Lacking infrastructure.
     * Lacking health care.
     * Lacking education.
     * Government corruption.
     * Overpopulation and lack of access to birth control methods. Note
       that population growth slows or even become negative as poverty is
       reduced due to the demographic transition.
     * Tax havens which tax their own citizens and companies but not those
       from other nations and refuse to disclose information necessary for
       foreign taxation. This enables large scale political corruption,
       tax evasion, and organized crime in the foreign nations.
     * Historical factors, for example imperialism and colonialism.
     * Capitalism, Socialism, Communism, Monarchy, Fascism and
       Totalitarianism have all been named as causes by scholars writing
       from different perspectives. For example, poorly functioning
       property rights is seen by some as a cause of poverty, while
       socialists see the institution of property rights itself as a cause
       of poverty.
     * Lacking free trade. In particular, the very high subsidies to and
       protective tariffs for agriculture in the developed world. For
       example, almost half of the budget of the European Union goes to
       agricultural subsidies, mainly to large farmers and agribusinesses,
       which form a powerful lobby. Japan gave 47 billion dollars in 2005
       in subsidies to its agricultural sector, nearly four times the
       amount it gave in total foreign aid. The US gives 3.9 billion
       dollars each year in subsidies to its cotton sector, including
       25,000 growers, three times more in subsidies than the entire USAID
       budget for Africa’s 500 million people. This drains the taxed money
       and increases the prices for the consumers in developed world;
       decreases competition and efficiency; prevents exports by more
       competitive agricultural and other sectors in the developed world
       due to retaliatory trade barriers; and undermines the very type of
       industry in which the developing countries do have comparative
       advantages.

   A homeless woman with her dog in a street of Rome
   A homeless woman with her dog in a street of Rome
     * Lack of freedom and social oppression.
     * Lack of social integration. For example, arising from immigration
       (see related article, Economic impact of immigration to Canada).
     * Slavery
     * Crime, both white-collar crime and blue-collar crime.
     * Substance abuse, such as alcoholism and drug abuse.
     * War, including civil war, genocide, and democide.
     * Brain drain
     * Lack of social skills.
     * Exploitation of the poor by the rich.
     * Even if not exploitation in the sense of theft, the already wealthy
       may have easier to accumulate more wealth, for example by hiring
       better financial advisors.
     * Matthew effect: the phenomenon, widely observed across advanced
       welfare states, that the middle classes tend to be the main
       beneficiaries of social benefits and services, even if these are
       primarily targeted at the poor.
     * Cultural causes, which attribute poverty to common patterns of
       life, learned or shared within a community. For example, Max Weber
       argued that Protestantism contributed to economic growth during the
       industrial revolution.
     * Individual beliefs, actions and choices.
     * Mental illness and disability
     * Discrimination of various kinds, such as age discrimination, gender
       discrimination, racial discrimination.

Effects of poverty

   A starving female child during the Nigerian-Biafran war of the late
   1960s. The abdomen is paradoxically swollen due to Kwashiorkor or
   severe protein malnutrition.
   A starving female child during the Nigerian-Biafran war of the late
   1960s. The abdomen is paradoxically swollen due to Kwashiorkor or
   severe protein malnutrition.

   Some effects of poverty may also be causes, as listed above, thus
   creating a " poverty cycle" and complicating the subject further:
     * Depression
     * Lack of sanitation.
     * Increased vulnerability to natural disasters
     * Extremism
     * Hunger and starvation
     * Human trafficking
     * High crime rate
     * Increased suicides
     * Increased risk of political violence; such as terrorism, war and
       genocide
     * Homelessness
     * Lack of opportunities for employment
     * Low literacy
     * Social isolation
     * Loss of population due to emigration.
     * Increased discrimination
     * Lower life expectancy
     * Drug abuse

Poverty reduction

   In politics, the fight against poverty is usually regarded as a social
   goal and many governments have — secondarily at least — some dedicated
   institutions or departments.

Economic growth

   World GDP per capita rapidly increased beginning with the Industrial
   Revolution.
   World GDP per capita rapidly increased beginning with the Industrial
   Revolution.
     * The anti-poverty strategy of the World Bank depends heavily on
       reducing poverty through the promotion of economic growth. However,
       some consider this approach does not actively or directly work to
       reduce or eliminate poverty. The World Bank argues that an overview
       of many studies show that:
          + Growth is fundamental for poverty reduction, and in principle
            growth as such does not affect inequality.
          + Growth accompanied by progressive distributional change is
            better than growth alone.
          + High initial income inequality is a brake on poverty
            reduction.
          + Poverty itself is also likely to be a barrier for poverty
            reduction; and wealth inequality seems to predict lower future
            growth rates.
     * The Global Competitiveness Report, the Ease of Doing Business
       Index, and the Index of Economic Freedom are annual reports, often
       used in academic research, ranking the worlds nations on factors
       argued to increase economic growth and reduce poverty.
     * Business groups see the reduction of barriers to the creation of
       new businesses , or reducing barriers for existing business, as
       having the effect of bringing more people into the formal economy.
     * The 2007 World Bank report "Global Economic Prospects" predicts
       that in 2030 the number living on less than the equivalent of $1 a
       day will fall by half, to about 550 million. An average resident of
       what we used to call the Third World will live about as well as do
       residents of the Czech or Slovak republics today. However, much of
       Africa will have difficulty keeping pace with the rest of the
       developing world and even if conditions there improve in absolute
       terms, the report warns, Africa in 2030 will be home to a larger
       proportion of the world's poorest people than it is today. However,
       economic growth has increased rapidly in Africa after the year
       2000.

Direct aid

     * The government can directly help those in need. This has been
       applied with mixed results in most Western societies during the
       20th century in what became known as the welfare state. Especially
       for those most at risk, such as the elderly and people with
       disabilities. The help can be for example monetary or food aid.

   A shanty town in Manila, Philippines.
   A shanty town in Manila, Philippines.
     * Private charity. This is often formally encouraged within the legal
       system. For example, charitable trusts and tax deductions for
       charity.
     * The Copenhagen Consensus is a listing of the most cost-effective
       methods for advancing global welfare.

Improving the social environment and abilities of the poor

     * Subsidized housing development and urban regeneration.
     * Subsidized education.
     * Subsidized health care.
     * Assistance in finding employment.
     * Subsidized employment (see also Workfare).
     * Encouragement of political participation and community organizing.
     * Community practice social work.

Millennium Development Goals

   Poverty-stricken Women washing their clothes by a Road in Mumbai,
   India.
   Poverty-stricken Women washing their clothes by a Road in Mumbai,
   India.

   Eradication of extreme poverty and hunger by 2015 is a Millennium
   Development Goal. In addition to broader approaches, the Sachs Report
   (for the UN Millennium Project) proposes a series of "quick wins",
   approaches identified by development experts which would cost
   relatively little but could have a major constructive effect on world
   poverty. The quick wins are:
     * Access to information on sexual and reproductive health.
     * Action against domestic violence.
     * Appointing government scientific advisors in every country.
     * Basic Income Guarantee
     * Citizen's Dividend
     * Deworming school children in affected areas.
     * Drugs for AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria.
     * Eliminating school fees.
     * Ending user fees for basic health care in developing countries.
     * Free school meals for schoolchildren.
     * Legislation for women’s rights, including rights to property.
     * Negative Income Tax
     * Planting trees.
     * Providing soil nutrients to farmers in sub-Saharan Africa.
     * Providing mosquito nets.
     * Access to electricity, water and sanitation.
     * Supporting breast-feeding.
     * Training programs for community health in rural areas.
     * Upgrading slums, and providing land for public housing.

Development aid

   Most developed nations give some development aid to developing nations.
   The UN target for development aid is 0.7% of GDP; currently only a few
   nations achieve this. Some think tanks and NGOs have argued, however,
   that Western monetary aid often only serves to increase poverty and
   social inequality, either because it is conditioned with the
   implementation of harmful economic policies in the recipient countries
   , or because it's tied with the importing of products from the donor
   country over cheaper alternatives, or because foreign aid is seen to be
   serving the interests of the donor more than the recipient. Critics
   also argue that much of the foreign aid is stolen by corrupt
   governments and officials and that higher aid levels erode the quality
   of governance. Policy become much more oriented toward what will get
   more aid money than it does towards meeting the needs of the people.

   Supporters argue that these problems may be solved with better audit of
   how the aid is used. Aid from non-governmental organizations may be
   more effective than governmental aid; this may be because it is better
   at reaching the poor and better controlled at the grassroots level. The
   Borgen Project, an anti-poverty advocacy organization, estimates the
   annual cost of eliminating starvation and malnutrition globally at $19
   billion a year. As a point of comparison, the annual world military
   spending is over $1000 billion.

Other approaches

   Some argue for a radical change of the economic system. There are
   several proposals for a fundamental restructuring of existing economic
   relations, and many of their supporters argue that their ideas would
   reduce or even eliminate poverty entirely if they were implemented.
   Such proposals have been put forward by both left-wing and right-wing
   groups: socialism, communism, anarchism, libertarianism, binary
   economics and participatory economics, among others.

   Inequality can be reduced by progressive taxation, wealth tax, and
   inheritance tax.

   In law, there has been a movement to seek to establish the absence of
   poverty as a human right.

   The IMF and member countries have produced Poverty Reduction Strategy
   papers or PRSPs.

   In his book "The End of Poverty", a prominent economist named Jeffrey
   Sachs laid out a plan to eradicate global poverty by the year 2025.
   Following his recommendations, international organizations such as the
   Global Solidarity Network are working to help eradicate poverty
   worldwide with intervention in the areas of housing, food, education,
   basic health, agricultural inputs, safe drinking water, transportation
   and communications.

   The Poor People's Economic Human Rights Campaign is an organization in
   the United States working to secure freedom from poverty for all by
   organizing the poor themselves. The Campaign believes that a human
   rights framework, based on the value of inherent dignity and worth of
   all persons, offers the best means by which to organize for a political
   solution to poverty.

Religious poverty

   St. Francis of Assisi renounces his worldly goods in a painting
   attributed to Giotto di Bondone.
   St. Francis of Assisi renounces his worldly goods in a painting
   attributed to Giotto di Bondone.

   Among some groups, in particular religious groups, poverty is
   considered a necessary or desirable condition, which must be embraced
   in order to reach certain spiritual, moral, or intellectual states.
   Poverty is often understood to be an essential element of renunciation
   among Buddhists and Jains, whilst in Roman Catholicism it is one of the
   evangelical counsels, and taken as a vow among certain religious
   orders. The way poverty is understood among these orders takes a
   variety of forms. For example, the Franciscan orders have traditionally
   forgone all individual and corporate forms of ownership. However, while
   individual ownership of goods and wealth is forbidden for Benedictines,
   following the Rule of St. Benedict, the monastery itself may possess
   both goods and money, and through history some monasteries have become
   very rich indeed.

   In this context of religious vows, poverty may be understood as a means
   of self-denial in order to place oneself at the service of others; Pope
   Honorius III wrote in 1217 that the Dominicans "lived a life of
   voluntary poverty, exposing themselves to innumerable dangers and
   sufferings, for the salvation of others". However, following Jesus'
   warning that riches can be like thorns that choke up the good seed of
   the word (Matthew 13:22), voluntary poverty is often understood by
   Christians as of benefit to the individual - a form of self-discipline
   by which one distances oneself from distractions from God.

Etymology

   The words "poverty" and "poor" came from Latin pauper = "poor", which
   originally came from pau- and the root of pario, i.e. "giving birth to
   not much" and referred to unproductive farmland or livestock.

   Retrieved from " http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poverty"
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   with only minor checks and changes (see www.wikipedia.org for details
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