the.com/poverty line
the government's answer to 'how broke is too broke,' drawn with a spreadsheet, not a heart.
means an official income threshold below which a person or household is officially classified as poor.
from popularized in the 1960s us war on poverty, when economist mollie orshansky calculated it as roughly three times a bare-bones food budget, back when families spent a third of income on groceries.
food math relicstill based on 1960s grocery spending ratios, mostly
no rent factororiginal formula barely accounted for housing costs
varies wildlyworld bank uses 2.15 dollars a day globally
doesn't mean comfortcrossing it still often means real deprivation
for instance
us federal poverty line — about 15060 dollars a year for one person in 2023
world bank threshold — 2.15 dollars a day, updated in 2022
china's 2020 benchmark — declared zero extreme poverty using its own line