Strategies to Measure Poverty

Strategies to broadsheet PovertyPoverty is a mixer problem and it has been subscribe toed as a feature of inequality in alliance. This view is shargond by Machperson Silburn (1998, 1), as they consider scantiness as a private road of political and morale challenges to all societies at all times.Roll (1992, 7) defined destitution as a shortage of some social occasion which is morally unacceptable and calls for action. Or in a more official way, poverty can be defined as the number of people with incomes be miserable an arbitrary per centimeage of the number Gordon et al (2000, 8).There be two types of poverty depending on the way that it is bard, those types be relative and absolute poverty. Absolute poverty refers to the minimum physical require that are associated with physical survival, taking account of food, clothing, and shelter (Roll, 1992, 14).On the some opposite hand, relative poverty is usually related to social needs and as is a feature of income inequality and can be described as being a comparison to something else (Roll, 1992, 15). In other words it could be the inability to have stuff that around people in night club think it is essential. To illustrate this and to to a lower placestand public opinion on the field of operation of necessities, a survey carried let out by 1500 people in 1999 produced the future(a) results over 90% of the population in each case discriminate beds and bedding for everyone, heating, damp-free home, visiting friends or family and medicine prescribed by dilute as items which adults should have in Britain. By contrast, little than 10 per cent sees mobile phones and mesh gateway as necessary Gordon et al (2000, 18).However, nowadays, internet access and mobile phones are considered as necessities to most people in society, so those who can non afford them are counted in relative poverty.There are many another(prenominal) ways to measure poverty and they could vary from country to another. The ideal of poverty aims to help develop overbold policies to reduce the extent of poverty, and enables politicians to regularise how many people live in poverty and what the social characteristics associated with them are, such as gender and age (MacPherson Silburn, 1998, 8). Each measure of poverty has advantages and disadvantages, and has polar influence on policy. For example, income thresholds prelude defines poverty as being under a specific threshold level in terms of households average income or benefit levels. In the UK, it is the most common measure of poverty, and a household is said to be in poverty if its income, after taxes, is less than 60% of the UK median for that year (Aldridge et al, 2013).The main advantage of this approach is that it is simplistic as it does not require detailed data from people (Gordon et al, 2000, 74), and that the standard of need is implicit in the benefit levels decided by authorities (Gordon et al, 2000, 74). However, there are some problems with employ this approach for example, it could be argued when the thresholds establish on the average income that it is measuring rod the inequality of income rather than measuring poverty. too MacPherson Silburn (1998, 14) argued that the benefit rates may be set at a very low rate, well below average earning, and thus do not provide an acceptable poverty threshold measure.Low income is a major problem in the United Kingdom, as it is at the perfume of poverty matters. It has short term as well as big term effects on individuals and society overall, as people who are in low income are more likely to have unplayful illnesses, for example Cancer mortality rates in the poorest areas (200 per 100,000) are 50% higher than average, and have not fallen in the last decade, sequence the average has fallen by one-sixth (Aldridge et al, 2013). Low income as well affects the entire British economy, as British society has turned out to be controlled by material goods and marke t relationships and any shortage would have a great effect on the economy. This means, that measuring poverty in the remediate way would help to reduce the pattern on low income (Kenway et al, 2002, 18).The cause of the rise and fall of the number of people with low income is debatable. Some consider it to be the individuals fault because laziness and passivity. However, others see it deeper than that and put the responsibility on the governings policies as Kenway et al (2002, 18) state that the chief weapons that have been employ in the assault on low income over the last few long time are first, reforms to the tax and benefit system and second, the national minimum wage. For example, if the government raises taxes and cuts d testify on benefits, as a result, the number of people on low income volition rise, as well as poverty. On the other hand, it could be argued that this weapon can be used in a positive way to decrease the number of people on low income and against poverty, by decreasing taxes and offering more/higher benefits. The same also applies for minimum wage, where it could be increased or decreased, which in turn will have an effect on the level of poverty in Britain. Thats why there are many measures of poverty, as each measure is used to look deeper into the problem from a different angle to try and resolve where the responsibility/blame lies and the best ways to deal and solve this problem.another(prenominal) way of measuring poverty is by using consensual/social indicators. This approach is very much dependent on social surveys and on public view of necessities. Not only the UK implemented this approach of measuring poverty, but many other countries did, such as, Denmark, Sweden, Holland, Germany and Vietnam. That made it one of the most common approaches of measuring poverty. However, it has been criticised because peoples responses are firmly based on their own subjective experience, which may be far removed from the poverty level (Mac Pherson Silburn, 1998, 12).Budget standard is another method to measure poverty. It is based on a very basic basket of goods, the only good thing about it is, that things can be put into or taken out of a figure standard easily (Gordon et al, 2000, 75). But when it comes to weakness points, budget standard has some, for example, it only focuses on a group of people and does not cover all types of people, such as, people from various cultures, or with modified needs, as Roll (1992, 39) confirms the argument is that people have different disbursement patterns so that, even if they had the same amount of income from benefit, they would not spend it on the basket of goods. Because of that, this approach is not used much now to measure poverty. So, other ways of measurement had to be developed such as social exclusion. This approach is used in the UK, and it focuses on the shortage of access to the types of social relations, norms and interests (Gordon et al, 2000). It refers more to relative poverty rather than absolute poverty.Lastly, poverty can be measured subjectively, or in other words, using subjective measures. This method is based on categorizing the poverty thresholds by society itself without any intervention from experts or the government, making it the most democratic approach of measuring poverty, which is the best thing about it. On the other hand, it could be argued that subjective poverty lines tend to fluctuate over time depending on changes in the social theatrical role group and on period of reference (Gordon et al, 2000,73).In conclusion, poverty is a serious issue which affects the individual as well as the whole society. Many elements are involved in it such as the place, time, income, gender, health, and benefits. And in order to take all of these into account, many approaches and methods have been developed for measuring poverty, each one being employ to a specific element. As a result, this has produced measures which look into the i ssue of poverty from various angles, which in turn, offer policy makers the opportunity to develop new rules and regulations to minimise poverty as much as possible.