The New Global Poverty Estimates – Digging Deeper into a Hole
17 Sep 2008
Recently, the World Bank released “updated” global poverty estimates. These new numbers are based on a new price survey and a new benchmark international poverty line of $1.25 in 2005 purchasing power parities (PPPs). The new figures purport to describe world poverty since 1981, and thus affect our understanding of the world over the last quarter century of globalization.
The new estimates also suggest that the number of poor is almost fifty per cent more than previously thought. Can the new estimates be trusted? Unfortunately, the numbers are based on the same methods used earlier and are undermined by the same problems as the earlier estimates.
The new international poverty line is too low to cover the cost of
purchasing basic necessities. One could not live in the US on $1.25 a day in 2005, nor therefore on an equivalent amount elsewhere. One’s daily income can be a great deal higher than $1.25 and still leave one unable to fulfill basic nutritional requirements. Since the international poverty line is defined in equivalent purchasing power units, this incoherence is not easy to overcome.
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Source: UNDP Poverty Centre
The new international poverty line is too low to cover the cost of
purchasing basic necessities. One could not live in the US on $1.25 a day in 2005, nor therefore on an equivalent amount elsewhere. One’s daily income can be a great deal higher than $1.25 and still leave one unable to fulfill basic nutritional requirements. Since the international poverty line is defined in equivalent purchasing power units, this incoherence is not easy to overcome.
Read More...
Source: UNDP Poverty Centre
