Poverty Threshold

The poverty threshold, also called the poverty line, is the minimum level of income that a particular country considers adequate to live on, and it is used to identify who counts as living in poverty. It is typically calculated by estimating the annual cost of necessities for an average adult, with housing usually making up the largest share of that cost, and thresholds are commonly adjusted for factors such as age, marital status, parental status and disability. Poverty thresholds are updated annually and vary widely between developed and developing countries, and they serve as a key measure for determining eligibility for government assistance programs and for tracking economic hardship across a population.