Conceptualizing Poverty Traditionally Sample Clauses

Conceptualizing Poverty Traditionally. Almost one-fifth of American children live “in poverty” at any particular point in time (CDF 2008). However, what individuals, researchers, and policy-makers mean when they invoke the term poverty varies with context. For instance, although Census estimates of the number of people living in poverty have remained relatively stable over the past 35 years, when viewed through a life course lens, chances for any individual experiencing acute poverty have increased in the past two decades (▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇, Rank, and ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ 2009). If viewed as a question of resources rather than income, estimates for those experiencing poverty also shift radically, particularly with the recent housing crisis. Subsequently, focusing on different conceptualizations of poverty may lead to varying empirical conclusions not because of a lack of “true” poverty but perhaps because researchers have only been measuring one aspect of the total poverty experience (Hagenaars 1991; ▇▇▇▇▇▇ and ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ 1998). Below, I review the history of the traditional definition of poverty as well as more recent definitions that researchers invoke to more accurately capture the full experience of poverty. I specifically focus on research that evaluates the impact of poverty on children’s outcomes. Most conceptualizations of poverty rely on the federal government’s annual estimation of the poverty threshold. The poverty threshold is an income level adjusted for multiple factors (e.g., household size, number of children, number of elderly, and inflation) that marks the point below which a household is considered “poor.” It stems from a 1965 estimate of how much food was necessary to maintain health, multiplied by the proportion of a low-income family’s total income that should be used to purchase food (Orshansky 1965; Iceland 2006; Rank 2005). The estimate is annually indexed to inflation by the Census Bureau. However, while the poverty threshold is used to estimate the number of people living in poverty each year, it is not this monetary amount that determines eligibility for federal aid programs. Eligibility for federal assistance is determined by poverty guidelines. The Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) sets the poverty guidelines each year to aid in determining which families are eligible for financial assistance or certain government programs. Poverty guidelines are similar but not identical to poverty thresholds. They are based on the previous year’s poverty threshold (e.g., the poverty guidelin...