ABSTRACT
By examining cross-nationally comparable measures of income and poverty, the author sheds some of that parochialism and come to appreciate how poverty compares to that of other nations, why we've embarked on the path we have, and where we might go in the future. Moreover, the author could do much better at reaching these goals if we made it a national priority to help those who try to escape poverty through their own work efforts. The official United States poverty line was 28 percent of this level in 2000, and 50 percent of this level in 1963 when it was first employed. The chapter defines poverty rates in the analyses that follow using this standard relative concept. The average rate of poverty is 10 percent across the twenty-one countries. If the nation is to be successful in reducing poverty, it will need to do a better job of combining work and benefits targeted to low-wage workers in low-income families.
