MillionsofMouths.com is a forum where you can join in a discussion about the problems of poverty and hunger.
Absolute Poverty is a condition characterised by severe deprivation of basic human needs, including food, safe drinking water, sanitation facilities, health, shelter, education and information. It depends not only on income but also on access to services. (According to a UN declaration from Copenhagen in 1995. Info in this section on absolute poverty from Wikipedia)
In developing countries, poor people
spend up to 80 % of their disposable income
on food.
There is no buffer to modify their food
costs. Those who always lived on the
edge of starvation have been tipped over
that edge by spiraling prices. Economic
theory known as Engel’s Law notes that
the proportion of a nation’s income spent
on food is a good measure of the nation’s
welfare.
This is part of an article from the July issue of Spotlight on Orphans newsletter.
The official poverty rate in the US was 12.3% for 2006. (The last year stats available for.)
The US is now in a resession and the poverty rate is probably much worse now.
Poverty and Hunger World Poverty Poor and Hungry Children World Hunger Absolute Poverty Feed Hungry Children Poor and Needy Children
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