The current measurement of poverty in the United States is called the poverty threshold. The poverty threshold is defined as "the minimum level of resources that are adequate to meet basic needs of a person." The United States Census bureau reported that 13.4% of Americans are considered to be living in poverty today. To think that 13.4% of American’s live in poverty and some people think that number could be much higher with an updated poverty measurement. Why wouldn’t the United States government do its research to have an accurate number of people impoverished. The united states Poverty threshold is outdated and needs to be completely revised to meet the needs of people in the year 2017.
In the 1964 state of the union address, Lyndon B. …show more content…
Originally the President's Council of Economic Advisors developed their own measurement of poverty. But when the president declared the war on poverty, Mollie’s supervisor asked her to extend her previous research from 1963 to the whole population. Once she completed the research in 1965 it was published in Social Security bulletin titled "Counting the Poor: Another Look at the Poverty Profile". As Mollie’s work was being published the government was setting up the Office of Economic Opportunity (OEO) the agency in charge of the War on Poverty. The OEO officials were happy with Orshansky's poverty threshold work. They described them as "second generation definition of poverty." In May of 1965, the OEO adopted Mollie's threshold for statistical, planning, and budget purposes. In August of 1969 the federal government made her threshold the official statistical definition of …show more content…
The first reason is that the current poverty level is based on outdated assumptions about family spending. The amount of money spent on food is only one-seventh of average family income. Expenses like housing, health care, and child care have grown astronomically. With these expenses growing at a different rate it makes the poverty numbers more and more off every year we don’t change how we calculate them. The second reason is that the method used to determine if a family is poor does not account for family resources. Government benefits such as Medicaid, SNAP, and housing and child assistance are not accounted for. So, the government isn’t able to use the statistics we gather to see if our current programs are effectively helping the impoverished. Why would we update our poverty threshold so we know if programs like these are
In the 1964 state of the union address, Lyndon B. …show more content…
Originally the President's Council of Economic Advisors developed their own measurement of poverty. But when the president declared the war on poverty, Mollie’s supervisor asked her to extend her previous research from 1963 to the whole population. Once she completed the research in 1965 it was published in Social Security bulletin titled "Counting the Poor: Another Look at the Poverty Profile". As Mollie’s work was being published the government was setting up the Office of Economic Opportunity (OEO) the agency in charge of the War on Poverty. The OEO officials were happy with Orshansky's poverty threshold work. They described them as "second generation definition of poverty." In May of 1965, the OEO adopted Mollie's threshold for statistical, planning, and budget purposes. In August of 1969 the federal government made her threshold the official statistical definition of …show more content…
The first reason is that the current poverty level is based on outdated assumptions about family spending. The amount of money spent on food is only one-seventh of average family income. Expenses like housing, health care, and child care have grown astronomically. With these expenses growing at a different rate it makes the poverty numbers more and more off every year we don’t change how we calculate them. The second reason is that the method used to determine if a family is poor does not account for family resources. Government benefits such as Medicaid, SNAP, and housing and child assistance are not accounted for. So, the government isn’t able to use the statistics we gather to see if our current programs are effectively helping the impoverished. Why would we update our poverty threshold so we know if programs like these are