definition of the poverty line?

seven-day-weekend

welshcakes wrote:

"ALMOST 10 per cent of single cannot afford to buy more than one pair of shoes for their children.

."

How many pairs of shoes are they supposed to have? I never bought more than one pair for my son when he was small.

I agree with the poster who questioned the definition of poverty. You don't see kids with swollen bellies and emaciated limbs and flies round their mouths in the UK. In fact, the poorest ones are given free milk and fruit (I'm not begrudging this, just illustrating a point).

If they can't have a new computer game doesn't mean they are living in poverty.

peter999

seven-day-weekend wrote:

How many pairs of shoes are they supposed to have? I never bought more than one pair for my son when he was small.

I agree with the poster who questioned the definition of poverty. You don't see kids with swollen bellies and emaciated limbs and flies round their mouths in the UK. In fact, the poorest ones are given free milk and fruit (I'm not begrudging this, just illustrating a point).

If they can't have a new computer game doesn't mean they are living in poverty.

The comparisons are with the norms in the UK now, not 30 years ago or in Africa.
Poverty will directly affect the development of children & families.

Flippant comments show the weakness of this forum.

Poverty doesn't exist in UK anymore, it can't do as it doesn't make news & doesn't make money !!

peter999

donna

Well i don't know what you would class as poverty but we have been finding it really hard since i lost my job in April. As a family of two adults and two teens we get £776 per month. This is a combination of CB/CTC/JSA. After paying our own mortgage and bills we have £50 per week for food, toiletries and household cleaning and washing products. Luckily our mortgage is not huge otherwise we would of lost the house by now.

Needless to say we have not had new clothes or shoes for the past 8 months, but we were lucky enough that we had plenty of lovely clothes from when we where better off. I find it really upsetting that the government will gladly pay 100% of someones rent but not a penny of the mortgage.

If it had not been for this site and others like it we would of never managed. I have really surprised myself and my family by learning to manage on £50 every week and now i'm finding it hard to remember what on earth i spent £120 per week shopping money on before.

Long live MSE and god bless you Martin and site members xxx

seven-day-weekend

peter999 wrote:

The comparisons are with the norms in the UK now, not 30 years ago or in Africa.
Poverty will directly affect the development of children & families.

Flippant comments show the weakness of this forum.

Poverty doesn't exist in UK anymore, it can't do as it doesn't make news & doesn't make money !!

peter999

I was intending my remarks to be serious and would not make flippant remarks about such a serious subject.

I honestly do not believe that by any sensible definition there is true poverty in the UK.

You could say the 'norms' in the Uk now include having a car or going on a foreign holiday, or having Sky TV. To say someone is living in poverty because they haven't got these is IMHO to trivialise the situation of people who Are living in poverty - i.e those who have not enough to eat and no mechanism to help them.

Could you tell me what the 'norms' are then please, if I have it wriong?

I know there are people who are finding it very hard to manage on a tiny amount of money and I sympathise with that and believe that measures should be taken to remedy their plight. But nowhere in the Uk are there chiildren dying of starvation because of government policies and if they only have one pair of shoes, at least they do have some shoes.

I truly believe that you can't say someone's living in poverty just because they haven't got as much as someone else.

The word Poverty either means something or it doesn't.

elliethecat

There has never been an "official" definition of what constitutes the poverty line. Over the years many academic studies have given their opinion on what this might be but their findings have never been formally accepted by any UK government.

However, any notion of poverty can, as you say, only be relative and people on a low income in the UK cannot really be compared to people who are close starvation in the third world.

That said, it's really hard to define poverty in the UK because everyone has a different idea of what being poor means!!

If you're really interested in definitions of poverty a quick search on Google, or a look at a social policy book discussing aspects of poverty should give you some pointers to the many studies on poverty in the UK from Roundtree and Booth's reports from the late 19th/early 20th century to present day work, of which there is an abundance.

peter999

seven-day-weekend wrote:

You could say the 'norms' in the Uk now include having a car or going on a foreign holiday, or having Sky TV. To say someone is living in poverty because they haven't got these is IMHO to trivialise the situation of people who Are living in poverty - i.e those who have not enough to eat and no mechanism to help them.

Could you tell me what the 'norms' are then please, if I have it wriong?

I know there are people who are finding it very hard to manage on a tiny amount of money

I think these are media generalisations.
I'm talking about people that are way below that of having Sky TV, car.

When I say norms, I'm saying you cannot compare UK with Africa.

I would say Poverty is when you have been trying to manage on a tiny amount of money for a long time which doesn't match a basic cost of living & cannot bring yourself up to earn sufficient money to turn it around.

peter999

Mrs_pbradley936

This is where the debate becomes interesting because when I look at how my great-grandmother used to live I would hate to live like that. She had an out house, running water (well cold tap) in the kitchen and gas light. She did not consider herself to be poor. She grew up like that and did not know anything different. When she moved into a place with electricity she would still cook toast around the coal fire on a fork! In her old place the only bills she had were rent and gas which was on a meter and took shillings. The rent was inclusive of rates (what would now be council tax).

When I was growing up we did not have central heating – we were not poor very few people had it. Also at one time the family would have a TV or a car, these days the husband and wife plus teenage children want one. In addition there is a TV not just in the sitting room but in the kitchen and the bedroom as well. So I suppose if you are “in want” you are poor, but years ago the only wants you had were shelter, food and clothing. Now youngsters do not just want shoes, they want a certain brand. In a few months they will want a different brand. Ditto for everything else and you have an advertising and marketing industry reinforcing that people must be in poverty because they cannot afford to be buying what they are told they must have.

krisskross

peter999 wrote:

I would say Poverty is when you have been trying to manage on a tiny amount of money for a long time which doesn't match a basic cost of living & cannot bring yourself up to earn sufficient money to turn it around.

peter999

and I would agree with you if we are talking about anyone without children. But I thought this was specifically about child poverty. Although i loathe our present corrupt, snouts in trough government, I have to say that they have ensured that no children need to suffer poverty.

Tuttifruitty_Theresa

Hi i'm not going to go into depth about poverty as we all know what is happening around the world, but unfortunately i do belive there is poverty is this country, children may have shoes on their feet but how many old people won't turn on their heating this winter (even with the £200 allowance) because they can't pay their gas bill, i'm on jsa at the moment i'm trying to find a job but it is difficult (was turned down for two just the other day, again), i would say i'm poor (was before i lost my job), i don't have telly, i can't afford the licence and couldn't afford it when i was working, i only buy the cheapest food i can get and it's a sad state of affairs that i'm not the only one in this country that lives like this, our country sends millions of pounds abroad every year but will they put the minimum wage up to a decent level - no, will they put benefit payment up no - and i don't just mean jsa but incap as well, the only thing i thank tony for is bringing in the minimum wage in but when you only earn £5.30 an hour it only just managed to pay my rent, council tax and bills.


theresa
xxx

Mrs_pbradley936

I think the problem is due to the cost of living being so high. By the time you take care of essentials such as rent/mortgage, council tax and utilities there is not much left if you are on a low wage and I have not even counted fares to get to work yet. I do know that when we had the rates system which was collected along side or included with council rent it was not as punitive as council tax is now, I do not remember people baulking at paying their rates but many people are complaining about the council tax nowadays.