topic 4: poverty and welfare

• It is very easy to forget that there is poverty all around the world and that people are still dying of hunger. 1 billion people in the world don’t have good housing. It is also very much present in rich countries e.g. USA. In Malta, over 80,000 people are considered to be at risk of poverty.
• What is poverty?

  Many people tend to associate poverty with developing countries like the charity model of children starving and dying etc. however, there are other version of poverty e.g. living in Malta and cant afford an essential like a fridge, you are experiencing some form of poverty (compared to the rest of your society, you have a significant disadvantage)
• Definition; The World Bank(2000): pronounced deprivation in wellbeing (this doesn't only mean lack of money)
• Sociologists do not have one agreement on how to define wellbeing.
• Poverty is very often defined as; absolute or relative
• Absolute; referred to also as subsistence poverty. Refers to a situation of not having enough income or resources required to satisfy basic needs. Not having the money or the ability to purchase the thing that your body needs to keep you alive -> water, food, clothing and shelter. Usually linked to developing countries. (if they get any less than these, they are dead) it is assumed that this standard can be universally applied and does not change over time
• it doesn’t mean that absolute poverty is found in the poorest developing countries. As it is also about access to use the literal money
• The institute for the developing studies in the UK, shows that the majority of people experiencing absolute poverty, actually live in middle income countries. Some people have tried to give a financial estimate, usually it is about $1.25 a day to live off of (includes necessities with taxes etc.)
• e.g. China and India are considered middle income countries because of their overall income success but that does not mean that a significant amount of the population is not living in poverty.
• One way that you can talk about each poverty is the poverty line.
• The poverty line; people whose income falls under the amount that they would need for certain necessities would be considered to be under the poverty line, and if you are just making ends meet exactly, you are at risk of poverty. The poverty line will be different for every country (usually adjusted depending on the cost of items in a place) – like a bare minimum.
• Sociologists have try to define it along with caloric intake -> stripped down to the medical, need X amount of calories to survive, if they get X they aren’t on the poverty line.
• Benefits of talking about absolute poverty; human beings do not differ dramatically around the world in what is needed like shelter. (universal standard)
• Absolute poverty has received a lot of criticism as what they consider basic in one society is not always considered basic in another, and the definition of the absolute poverty changes over time.
• This is why people don’t really define poverty in absolute terms because there is no definition of adequate needs as they depend on the person-> they have the food but have no gas, electricity, intellectual difficulties (unable to cook by themselves) etc. it also ignored social needs and habits so even if someone doesn’t get socialisation it feels as bad as starvation, as social interaction is needed for people.
• Apart from literal absolute needs, people have variable cultural needs e.g. the ability to offer somebody a cup of coffee. (social stigma can create hardship in people’s lives if they don’t have the necessities to afford cultural variables)
• So when we only define it by the absolute with “essentials” we remove a lot of social implications/variables/culture different which influence a person’s life. 

  When defining absolute poverty and figuring out what an “essential” is -> it would depend on value judgements (what is important or not).
• A minimum budget puts people in a horrible living situation as there would be no adjustment for sickness, emergencies (medication), etc.
• There are assumptions that people can afford to cook a good meal. The assumption that poor people have good knowledge on what they eat like people who do have the time and money for a nutritionist. That they are human beings without waste issues.
• Many sociologists take a more relative approach. Those who criticise absolute poverty use relative poverty.
• Poverty is not simply a lack of material possessions but also include people who are excluded from their lifestyles or their community. The types of diet of your community, travel, education, housing types, activities of leisure, etc. (exclusion from the wider experience)
• Relative; calculated as less than 60% of the median income of a place e.g. if the median income is $100 and you earn $60, then you are relatively poor in comparison to your society.
• In relative, the actual number is always going to change because it depends what the 60% is for a country
• Townsend: gives a thorough explanation of relative poverty: individuals, families, and groups in the population can be said to be in poverty when they lack the resources to obtain the types of diet, participate in the activities, and have the living conditions and amenities (features like ACs) which are customary or at least widely encouraged or approved in the societies to which they belong. Their resources (more than just money) are so seriously below those commanded by the average individual or family that they are in effect excluded from ordinary living patterns, customs, or activities.
• The standard is constantly changing as there is rapid social changes. Relative poverty definitions will constantly change because they use relation to standards of a particular place at a particular time
• One of the strengths of calculating poverty on relative terms is using a social definition. It shows that the concept of poverty can change from time to time and even in the same societies. Poverty in a multidimensional issue.
• There is criticism for relative poverty; if there is poverty then the result is social inequality. When you apply the theory of relative poverty to very rich or very poor societies, it starts to lose their value. Poverty is universal and inevitable if we keep saying that poverty is 60% or less of the income. Unless there is a truly equal society, the person under the 60% is going to be ‘poor’.
• Redistribution of wealth; a concept. The rich only get rich because they don’t pay the workers enough (according to critics). In order to make things fairer, you need to redistribute wealth -> people who earn huge amounts should be taxed at higher rates. Townsend believes that equalising inequalities will give better results in improving relative poverty – raising welfare benefits
• People that support absolute poverty as a definition say that just because someone has less than others, doesn’t mean that they are living in deprivation
• For people who experience poverty, especially people who don’t have financial resources, their problems are doubled as society does not pay attention as much to the homeless, beggars, people on social benefits etc. they are discriminated against by stigma and disrespect along with no financial support
• Another dimension of poverty is the subjective feeling of being poor. Some people may feeling financially poor but spiritually very rich and vice versa.
• Who are the poor? Some groups are more likely to experience poverty. Children even though aren’t thought of, are poor, along with people with pension (as if something changes they could easily cross the poverty line), single parents (hard to raise children on a single wage), disabled people (already a number of jobs they cant do and are stigmatized against), women and ethnic minorities (they were paid less but only very recently they have been getting paid).
• The working poor: the poor people who no matter how much they work, cannot meet the right amount for living
• Certain people hit multiple categories – stigmatized in more than one way, they might be double discriminated e.g. woman and black in a white society giving more importance to men. They stack on top of each other.
• In Malta, the way the official poverty statistics are calculated is by relative terms. (like through income tax, declarations of income, government salaries etc) its not going to be a perfect measure. Taken as estimate for the overall with the 60% of the medium. 15% of people in Malta are under the poverty line.
• In 2020, Malta – it was calculated at 10,222 euros. this was considered that if you earn less that 10,222 euros a year, you are at risk of poverty (60% of the average income)
• Some institutes also calculate on disposable income – the money that we have left after paying for essential (after food, water, shelter etc) according to the EU SILC, in 2019, 20% of the people living in private households in Malta, were at risk of poverty (1/5 people).
• Persons are at risk of poverty or social exclusion if they are in at least of one the following states;

  1.     Financially at risk of poverty

  2.     Severely materially deprived (lack clothing, bed, etc)

  3.     Households with very low work intensity (e.g. 5 adults in one household, and only 1 of you works -> relying on one person’s income)
• The largest amount of people who are at risk of poverty in Malta are the elderly. Even with expenses covered by the government, the health is more precarious which leads to more cost along with their age making them depend on pension as they cannot work after 65 years.
• In 2020, Caritas tried to find out realistically in Malta, how much a family needs to earn to meet their needs with 3 categories of family types;

  Elderly couples -> 8,156 euros

  Lone parent with 2 dependent children -> 11,038 euros

  Couple of 2 adults with 2 dependent children -> 13,946 euros