poverty line

Definition of poverty line

: a level of personal or family income below which one is classified as poor according to governmental standards

— called also poverty level

Examples of poverty line in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web His figure incorporates both jobless workers — people who were actively searching for work in the past month — as well as adults who are earning below $20,000 a year, or below the poverty line. — Aimee Picchi, CBS News, "1 in 4 Americans are jobless or earning poverty-level wages, new study finds.," 20 Nov. 2020 In Texas, most people currently covered by Medicaid are children, people with disabilities and low-income seniors, leaving most adults living below the poverty line without access. — Allie Morris, Dallas News, "As COVID-19 leaves Texans jobless and lacking health insurance, lawmakers mull expanding Medicaid," 3 Nov. 2020 With 55 percent of its families living below the poverty line, Hough is poor. — Steven Litt, cleveland, "Cleveland Foundation’s move to Hough welcomed after decades of local fears over institutional land grabs," 1 Nov. 2020 Black residents in Halifax, though, are more likely to be poor — about 32% live below the poverty line, compared with 15% of White residents, according to the North Carolina Justice Center, an advocacy nonprofit. — Matt Vasilogambros, Tim Henderson, USA TODAY, "'At a huge disadvantage': How this North Carolina county struggles to find polling places," 31 Oct. 2020 Today, the city is 90% Black and 40% of people live below the poverty line. — Leah Willingham, Star Tribune, "Mississippi city won't lose lights after threat over debt," 30 Oct. 2020 The payments are often an acknowledgment that civilian victims are frequently family breadwinners — in a country where 90 percent of the population is estimated to subsist below the poverty line, with little or no official economic safety net. — Najim Rahim, New York Times, "How an Afghan Political Crisis Derailed Payments to War Victims," 27 Oct. 2020 Unemployment in the camp stood at 40%, and 52% of residents were below the poverty line before the COVID-19 pandemic. — Taylor Luck, The Christian Science Monitor, "Rooftop farms in Jordan help Gazans reconnect with lost land," 27 Oct. 2020 Economic inequality has reached extreme levels in Nigeria, according to the United Nation Human Rights Commission, while Oxfam reported that in 2019 close to 70% of the country's population lives below the poverty line. — Stephanie Busari, CNN, "Nigeria's youth finds its voice with the EndSARS protest movement," 25 Oct. 2020

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'poverty line.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

Keep scrolling for more

Learn More about poverty line

Dictionary Entries near poverty line

Poverty Point National Monument

Statistics for poverty line

Last Updated

23 Nov 2020

Cite this Entry

“Poverty line.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/poverty%20line. Accessed 28 Nov. 2020.

WORD OF THE DAY

capitulate

Listen to the pronunciation of capitulate

See Definitions and Examples »

Get Word of the Day daily email!

Test Your Vocabulary

A Thanksgiving Word Quiz

November comes from a word for which of the following numbers?

11 12
10 9

Can you spell these 10 commonly misspelled words?

Test Your Knowledge - and learn some interesting things along the way.