Joseph Rowntree Foundation - UK Poverty increase

[MrOnyx]

Anyone care to pitch a guess at an absolute poverty line? It's all very well saying poverty is hard to define etc etc but that doesn't mean one can't have a go.

I reckon a decent standard of living ANYWHERE would be:
- Dwelling which is safe and weatherproof
- Adults one person or one couple to a bedroom
- Children two same-sex children to a bedroom (not sure about this one)
- Indoor temp of 18-26 degrees most of the time
- Sufficient nutritious food and a kitchen to cook it in
- Transport to a job which is less than an hour (90 mins?) away
- Internet access (unless you genuinely have no need for it)
- Medical care

I like this list, with one or two caveats. Until a certain age, I don't know if it's 100% necessary to avoid having mixed sex children share a room. Until the adolescent stage (or until they just get independent enough to want their own space from one another), I don't personally see harm in having children share rooms with opposite-sex children. Not a parent, though, so don't take that as gospel.

Internet access has very quickly become a lifeline for us, but I think if someone was destitute (at least if I was), I'd try and live without it. I just know I would struggle, of course, but it would be no higher on the priority list than food.

The mention of commuting time is an interesting consideration I hadn't thought of in the context of poverty. I suppose I would be quite sympathetic towards someone who could only get a job three hours away, but then, one must think surely there's one closer?

Also, as much as I agree with that last point about medical care, I can't help but notice that putting that on a list defining poverty would put many lower-working-to-middle class Americans in the poverty box.

People are welcome to voluntarily deprive themselves of such things but they should be able to AFFORD them.

For me, this is the difference between someone pursuing FIRE and someone who is below the waterline of poverty, and unable to pull themselves out.

[shelivesthedream]

Also, as much as I agree with that last point about medical care, I can't help but notice that putting that on a list defining poverty would put many lower-working-to-middle class Americans in the poverty box.

Yes. I am OK with this as a consequence of my definition of poverty. However, if people could afford medical care but are deciding to spend their money on other things that aren't on the "necessary for a decent life" list then they are voluntarily depriving themselves of them. (Not making a comment on how many people do this, just saying.)

education to aged 16 (or appropriate alternative)

I would maybe change this to "education sufficient that they can support themselves in a decent lifestyle in their community"?

[cerat0n1a]

Anyone care to pitch a guess at an absolute poverty line? It's all very well saying poverty is hard to define etc etc but that doesn't mean one can't have a go.

I reckon a decent standard of living ANYWHERE would be:
- Dwelling which is safe and weatherproof
- Adults one person or one couple to a bedroom
- Children two same-sex children to a bedroom (not sure about this one)
- Indoor temp of 18-26 degrees most of the time
- Sufficient nutritious food and a kitchen to cook it in
- Transport to a job which is less than an hour (90 mins?) away
- Internet access (unless you genuinely have no need for it)
- Medical care

As a primary school child, we had 3 children in one bedroom, house temperature certainly went far below 18 degrees in winter as there was no central heating and of course there was no internet access (and no inside toilet.) And this was a family with 2 middle-class working parents. I think we had it better than most of the children I went to school with.

Seems pretty clear to me that the definition of poverty has (correctly) moved somewhat since the 1970s and there is a 'relative' component to that. I think a lot of the motivation of people voting for Brexit (or Trump) is not so much that they are poor in any useful absolute sense - a large part of the UK population lives better than the richest people alive a century ago. It's the fact that they feel other people are doing much better than them. If you have no shoes and no-one else does, you feel OK about yourself. If you have one old pair of shoes and everyone else has a new pair every day, you feel poor even though objectively you're better off than the person with no shoes.

[shelivesthedream]

I didn't mean the whole house, I suppose - maybe just one main room (kitchen/living). And of course you didn't have internet - nobody did! And the world was set up so nobody needed it. It's hard now trying yo find jobs and places to rent without the internet. Back in the day it wasn't.

[ck425]

This is a complex field. I have two points to add:

1) Many of the negative ramifications of poverty are associated with relative poverty, rather than absolute poverty. The less than 60% of median may or  may not be a good way to measure relative poverty.

2) There's a large difference between living off of £Xk and only having an income of £Xk. While many of us could happily live off of what's considered poverty pay, earning more and saving it is very different to earning just that level.

[vand]

This excellent article questions the very notion that inequality (relative poverty) is on the rise:

https://moneyweek.com/507810/is-inequality-on-the-rise/

The paper it refers to is here:

https://www.ifs.org.uk/inequality/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/The-IFS-Deaton-Review-launch_final.pdf