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May 25, 2007
World poverty
When we watch TV or read the newspaper we often see images of people in foreign countries living in horrible poverty. It's easy to get the impression that little progress has been made in reducing world poverty. But when you look at the statistics, says N.C. State University economist Mike Walden, progress is being made. Listen
"Fortunately … there has been progress in reducing world poverty," says Dr. Walden, an economist with North Carolina Cooperative Extension. "The World Bank has developed a standard; they call it the dollar-a-day standard, and they estimate the number of people worldwide who are living on less than a dollar a day.
"Now when these numbers are calculated and especially when the dollar-a-day standard is used, the economists who do these calculations are very careful to consider differences in purchasing power between countries and also changes in purchasing power over time," he adds. "The good news is that the number of people living on less than a dollar a day in the world has dropped from 1.25 billion folks in 1990 to under 1 billion today. Still a large number, but at least going in the right direction.
"Stated another way, if we look at the percentage of the world's population living on less than a dollar a day, it's fallen from 29 percent in 1990 to 18 percent today," Walden says.
"So I think you'd have to say certainly progress has been made, but certainly more work needs to be done."
Posted by deeshore at May 25, 2007 08:00 AM