The Poverty Line Gets a Makeover

by M G · 2010-03-04 17:13:00 UTC
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Government definitions don't mean a whole lot to most people. If you're poor, you're poor, no matter where you sit in relation to someone's arbitrary classification. So should any of us care about this week's seemingly dry announcement that the Commerce Department is releasing a "supplemental" poverty measure? Absolutely.

Obviously the government standard isn't going to be the first thing on the mind of someone who is struggling to get enough to eat. But if you care about government funding of anti-poverty programs or nonprofits fighting poverty on the front lines, that seemingly dry government announcement becomes a whole lot more relevant.

Ever since it was first spelled out in 1965, the federal definition of poverty has been based exclusively on the cost of an emergency food diet. Oh, and that's the 1955 cost, adjusted for inflation but not the rising cost of food. Do high rent, medical bills, transportation costs or any of those other basics of living contribute to how poor or rich a family is? Not in the minds of the federal government. Until next fall, that is.

Starting in September 2011, the government will incorporate all of those other non-food bills as well as factoring in the cost of living in a given city and including food stamps and other benefits as "income." That is expected to raise the percentage of Americans living in poverty from 13.2 to 15.8 percent (an additional eight million all-of-a-sudden poor Americans), which should mean more funding for social services both from the government and nonprofits. It will also give a much more realistic (though probably still not perfect) estimate of who is poor, which in turn will inform future conversations about poverty in America.

Now the catch. The reason the new and improved guideline is called supplemental is because it will not replace the outdated one when determining who qualifies for government assistance. The new number will be printed alongside the old one, just reminding us that the previous standard is woefully out-of-date. But it’s an important start.

Photo credit: aflcio2008

M G was most recently a staff reporter for The Washington Post, covering philanthropy and nonprofits, education and the war in Iraq.
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