The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #99746   Message #1991666
Posted By: Jean(eanjay)
09-Mar-07 - 01:04 PM
Thread Name: BS: Poverty in the USA
Subject: RE: BS: Poverty in the USA
Poverty
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Poverty is a condition in which a person or community is deprived of, or lacks the essentials for a minimum standard of well-being and life. Since poverty is understood in many senses, these essentials may be material resources such as food, safe drinking water, and shelter, or they may be social resources such as access to information, education, health care, social status, political power, or the opportunity to develop meaningful connections with other people in society.

Poverty may also be defined in relative terms. In this view income disparities or wealth disparities are seen as an indicator of poverty and the condition of poverty is linked to questions of scarcity and distribution of resources and power. Poverty may be defined by a government or organization for legal purposes, see Poverty threshold.

Poverty is also a type of religious vow, a state that may be taken on voluntarily in keeping with practices of piety.

There is a lot more and it gives ways for measuring poverty. It is interesting to look at the definition in relative terms.