"Poverty is hunger. Poverty is lack of shelter. Poverty is being sick and not being able to see a doctor. Poverty is not having access to school and not knowing how to read. Poverty is not having a job,is fear for the future, living one day at a time. Poverty is losing a child to illness brought about by unclean water.Poverty is powerlessness, lack of representation and freedom."
The Basics
When estimating poverty worldwide, the same reference poverty line has to be used, and expressed in a common unit across countries. Therefore, for the purpose of global aggregation and comparison, the World Bank uses reference lines set at $1 and $2 per day (more precisely $1.08 and $2.15 in 1993 Purchasing Power Parity terms). 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. These figures are lower than earlier estimates, indicating that some progress has taken place, but they still remain too high in terms of human suffering, and much more remains to be done. The Global Poverty Monitoring Database, by Chen and Ravallion at the World Bank contains global and regional poverty estimates for the years 1981, 1984, 1987, 1990, 1993, 1996, 1999 and 2001 as well as data on the share of people living below the national poverty line by country for the years when household surveys are available.Recent years have witnessed a lively debate on global poverty measurement. For more information go to The Global Poverty Numbers Debate.
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Trends in Poverty Over Time
Living standards have risen dramatically over the last decades. The proportion of the developing world's population living in extreme economic poverty -- defined as living on less than $1 per day has fallen from 28 percent in 1990 to 21 percent in 2001. Substantial improvements in social indicators have accompanied growth in average incomes. Infant mortality rates in low- and middle-income countries have fallen from 86 per 1,000 live births in 1980 to 60 in 2002. Life expectancy in these countries has risen from 60 to 65 between 1980 and 2002.Adult literacy has also improved, though serious gender disparities remain. Male adult literacy (ages 15 and over) rose from 78% to 83% in low income countries between 1990 and 2002. While female literacy rates rose from 62% to 70%.
Why this is Important
In the world today, poverty is a very important issue. Most of us, her in the U.S., live a comfortable middle-class life. We never feel that we don't have enough food, wonder what we are going to feed our kids for dinner, or wonder if we are going to live for another day in our life. We really need to focus on those people who do not have the luxuries that we do, but have nothing at all and rely on grass or mud for their daily meal. We need to take a stand and let people know that not everyone has a middle class life. Also, many innocent children die from a lack of food or water EVERY SECOND. Not every day, or every month, EVERY SECOND. HAve you ever taken a moment, just a moment, of your day and thought about a poor child that has just died from the lack of food? I doubt it. We need to take a stand and help these families who are losing loved ones by the day and donate all that we can to help them out of this tragic time.
- WHAT WE NEED TO KNOW
