By Ayden Rodriguez ’27
How can we help those in extreme poverty?
Poverty worldwide is hugely problematic. Millions of people are in extreme poverty, living off what little income that they have and struggling to get ahold of basic things (more especially in poorer or developing countries) like education, water, housing, clothes, food, and any other basic things we have that they don’t and/or have extremely limited amounts of.
Firstly, poverty is a problem for families and children. Not having enough money results in starvation, thirst, bad living conditions, etc. It shows how they struggle and that they aren’t able to earn enough to live normally. Millions of people live like this. Around 700 million people are living in poverty, which causes a lot of suffering and struggle for families and single people who have to face this. Millions of people live with single-digit wages every day, and enough people face it where poverty might not be solved for a while. For example:
“Nearly 700 million people (8.5% of the world’s population) live in extreme poverty, surviving on less than $2.15 per day” (“Global poverty: Facts, FAQs, and how to help”). Also, “According to the most recent estimates, in 2024 almost 700 million people around the world were subsisting on less than $2.15 per day. The share of the world’s workers living in extreme poverty fell by half over the last decade: from 14.3 per cent in 2010 to 7.1 per cent in 2019. However, in 2020 it rose for the first time in two decades after the COVID-19 pandemic. It is projected that the global goal of ending extreme poverty by 2030 will not be achieved, with more than 600 million people still living in extreme poverty” (“Ending Poverty | United Nations”). It would be so hard for all of these people to exit extreme poverty and have a stable life. Most will still be in poverty until it’s resolved, but even then, there could be setbacks which further stunt the progress of abolishing poverty. Progress is still some progress though, as poverty is something that we can slowly fix with time, and there will always be different ways to.
Poverty is a huge factor in how children can develop in the future. Not having an education, enough food or water, housing, and unhygienic clothes and environments can negatively impact how the child develops, causing them to have problems in the future. This also includes how single parents or couples have to spend more if they have a child or multiple children, which is even more detrimental because they spend more money which they soon won’t have and/or cutting it close to the minimum. Any benefits for their low income are cancelled out because of its insignificance, which shows how deep people are in this problem. For example, “Many people are in insecure, low-wage service sector jobs which do not pay enough to support their family. They may not be able to find work that offers better pay and conditions” (“Causes of poverty | CPAG”). Plus, “Since 2010, about £50 billion has been taken from the annual social security budget through policies such as benefit freezes, the two-child limit, the ‘bedroom tax’ and the benefit cap. Cuts in housing benefit mean that many families have to make up a shortfall in rent. The system is doing less when it needs to do more” (“Causes of poverty | CPAG”). Finally, “People on benefits also often have money taken from their benefits payments for things like repaying an advance, which reduces already low payments even more” (“Causes of poverty | CPAG”).
Extreme Poverty is not limited to today; it has been going on for centuries, and still in large amounts. Historically, impoverished people experienced the same problems as people today, like a lack of education, food, water, etc. The economy of a country might have a role in how extreme poverty is: poor economic growth in countries could result in millions of people trapped in extreme poverty, where their jobs don’t pay enough and/or unemployment abounds. Some evidence is, ‘There are poor people in every country, people who live in poor housing and who struggle to afford basic goods and services like heating, transport, and healthy food for themselves and their families. The definition of poverty differs from country to country, but in high-income countries, the poverty line is around $30 per day” (Roser). Some more evidence is, “Two centuries ago, the majority of the world population was extremely poor. Back then, it was widely believed that widespread poverty was inevitable, but this turned out to be wrong. Economic growth is possible, and poverty can decline. The world has made immense progress against extreme poverty. But even after two centuries of progress, extreme poverty is still the reality for every tenth person in the world” (“Key Insights on Poverty”). The millions of people could maybe be helped if the towns, cities, states, maybe entire countries put some time into this problem, poverty could be slowly eradicated.
Though it seems that poor countries have the most poverty in it, wealthier countries also have extreme poverty, which is extremely concerning considering. Things we can do to help them could be simply giving donations, putting in volunteer hours, and helping out those in need. It seems as though everywhere some people go, there is always a problem and they are still in poverty, whether they came from a poor to rich country. Around a million and a half people have to live with under $2.00 an hour, which today will not be able to get them really anything. Some evidence is, “Although the majority of the people living in extreme poverty reside in developing nations, extreme poverty has yet to be eradicated from even the wealthiest of countries in the world. A recent study conducted by sociologists from Harvard and the University of Michigan have determined that extreme poverty in the United States still exists. Nearly 1.65 million households in the United States survive on less than $2 a day. This figure accounted for 4.3% of all non-elderly households with children” in the United States” (Kline). What’s more, poverty reaches rich and poor countries alike, and the impoverished need aid no matter where they live. “The difference between the impoverished living in a wealthy country and a developing one, however, is that wealthy countries have well-established safety nets for those living below the poverty line. In other parts of the world, this is not the case, making foreign assistance to these areas even more critical to ensure that the impoverished have their most basic human needs fulfilled” (Kline).
These two pieces of evidence explain the problems with poverty worldwide even in richer countries, showing how trapped these people might be and that they most likely shouldn’t be doing this alone. If we were to help them financially, get them food and water, clean clothes, etc., it could change millions of lives. Helping all of the people will take lots of time, but it’s possible if everyone chips in to help, like charities and organizations helping those in need.
Works Cited
“Causes of poverty | CPAG.” Child Poverty Action Group, https://cpag.org.uk/child-poverty/causes-poverty. Accessed 12 May 2025.
“Ending Poverty | United Nations.” the United Nations, https://www.un.org/en/global-issues/ending-poverty. Accessed 13 May 2025.
“Global poverty: Facts, FAQs, and how to help.” World Vision, 29 July 2024, https://www.worldvision.org/sponsorship-news-stories/global-poverty-facts. Accessed 13 May 2025.
“Key Insights on Poverty.” Our World in Data, https://ourworldindata.org/poverty. Accessed 13 May 2025.
Kline, Jordan. “Extreme Poverty in the United States.” July 23 2013, https://borgenproject.org/extreme-poverty-in-the-united-states/. Accessed 13 May 2025.
Roser, Max. “Extreme poverty: How far have we come, and how far do we still have to go?” Our World in Data, 22 November 2021, https://ourworldindata.org/extreme-poverty-in-brief. Accessed 13 May 2025.
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