Independent article here (http://news.independent.co.uk/world/politics/article311066.ece)

whilst I think that the UN is possibly not being overly objective it still is quite scary. I'd be interested to know how bad some of the worst areas of the UK are in comparison. I suppose that the benefits system keeps poverty at a certain level.

I've never seen poverty here that is anywhere as bad as it is in America. It's bad here, but nowhere as bad as it is in parts of America... I don't know anyone here who doesn't have running water or electricity.

A further interesting development from this , is what is , 'objective poverty ' and what constitutes , 'relative poverty '?
Unless everyone in the world had exactly the same standard of living , there will presumably always be relative poverty , by pure definition."Catching up" is difficult I should think too. Whilst efforts are being made to get the poorest a bit richer , the ,"middles " and , "uppers " have probably moved further up too , so that the elimination of relative poverty becomes doubly difficult .
Then , there's absolute poverty ! If a family in America has no running water or electricity but have enough to eat , a car , calor gas and a reasonable home , can that be counted as poverty on the African Scale [ or elsewhere ]. ?
Can we talk rationally about , "international poverty " or can we only consider it within a country ? What about , "cultural and educational " poverty ?
All very complicated and I would guess it's a question that professional economists will be arguing about for years to come --------if not longer !

imo poverty has to be looked at relatively.

Absolute poverty for me in say the UK would be the homeless. When you lack food, shelter, wter, facilities etc.

I know why I studied socilolgy the interpretation of relative poverty in the UK included not having a tv. I wholey disagree with that. Research didn't weem to discriminate whether someone had or could afford a tv which seemed daft. Same with car ownership.

I also think poverty of oppurtunity is a major factor.

Yes Robbie , a good point about , 'equality of opportunity ' ; I forgot about that.
I'm sure if people know they have a chance to improve their situation , then it alleviates their [present] poor lifestyle somewhat.
The really ghastly situation is to live in what I'll call , for convenience , "African" poverty and to see no possibility of improving things.

Originally posted by robbie
imo poverty has to be looked at relatively.

Absolute poverty for me in say the UK would be the homeless. When you lack food, shelter, wter, facilities etc.

I know why I studied socilolgy the interpretation of relative poverty in the UK included not having a tv. I wholey disagree with that. Research didn't weem to discriminate whether someone had or could afford a tv which seemed daft. Same with car ownership.

I also think poverty of oppurtunity is a major factor.

Unicef's definition is households with income below 50% of the national average. In the UK about 15% of our kids currently live in such households, - in Scandavian countries the figure is below 5%.

The UK has nothing to be complacent about, - we come seventh from bottom of a list of 24 industrialised nations studied by Unicef.

The US is different to the general European model because of the medicare situation. In UK I suspect poverty is a significant factor in opportunity as there is still a bias against working class kids in Universities.

Greybeard

I find UNICEF's report a bit puzzling if it said that.
Surely there are ALWAYS going to be 50% below the average , by definition ?
If you had a super-rich society , say like Kuwait once was , you'd find that most of the 50% were living lives of , what we in the U.K. now , would call luxury.
Also , unless the poorer 50% were all childless there would have to be children in the group too .
The whole statistical operation seems a bit ........well.......pointless , somehow !

Robbie,

I have to agree. Poverty and homelessness are a national disgrace in the US. Homelessness spiked considerably as a result of budget cutbacks for treating the mentally ill a few years back. Many were just thrown out on the streets and no tangible progress has been made to correct the problem. Poverty levels are on the rise among ethnic minority groups and the divide between the "haves" and "have-nots" is widening. We are seeing a major decline the size of the middle class as a result of outsourcing, corporate greed and corruption and poor domestic government policies.

Some sort of change is definitely needed before it gets even further out of hand.

:(

When I was in San francisco a while back I was suprised at the amount of homeless people who were everywhere,I think the situation is much worse over there.

Sorry , Greybeard , I think my statistics and understanding of Unicef's report were a bit wrong there .
However , by the Unicef definition , there will always tend to be a lot of people existing or living on a wage below the average .
As far as I can remember , the average income for people in Brirtin was about 350 pounds a month-------or is that only for salaries and wages , not including benefitsand pensions.?
Anyway I take it to mean that most pensioners , people on low wages and people on benefit are classed as , 'living in poverty '. I don't want to seem callous but are these people starving ? Living on the streets ? No form of entertainment ? No access to libraries , sports arenas ......etc.....If the answer is , "No" , then as far as I can see , there is always going to be a large number of people in this group-------unless we all , more or less earned exactly the same . As I mentioned on my earlier thread , the problem is whilst one is helping the poorest group to get richer , the others will probably have moved up too and so the average income will have moved up.Thus we get a never-ending situation of , "poverty " , no matter what the actual level is .
It's probably even more complicated than that but I am honestly trying to undestand it , as it's a question that has always been a big bone of contention when people discuss social problems , in general .

Originally posted by Fareast
Sorry , Greybeard , I think my statistics and understanding of Unicef's report were a bit wrong there .
However , by the Unicef definition , there will always tend to be a lot of people existing or living on a wage below the average .

Well It's not really about actual numbers but the proportion of a country's population living in relative poverty. For the US as a whole it's around 20%, but for New Orleans it's 30%. For the UK 15% but for Sweden less than 5%.

In developed counties poverty is an issue of our collective social conscience. Consumers want cheap goods and services, the providers want to maximise profits, the pigs in the middle are the workers who are paid the minimum wage our social conscience is comfortable with - enough to give them a roof over their heads,light, heat, a TV set and keep them from actually starving.

In the UK there are large numbers of people working full time who have to be supported by various state benefits to prevent them sliding into Victorian conditions of poverty. Gordon Brown has become our social conscience, but at the same time he is a fairy godmother to the employers, boosting their profits by subsiding their payroll costs.

I'm sure the condition of the poor in China is far worse than here, - but that's not the topic :)