Poverty is now deemed being without an ipod.
Understanding Poverty in America
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=NjJiMDE5Y2M1OWNmNDFhMDIwNWMxYTA1Mzk5ZDkxMTk=
The average person identified as “poor” by the government has a living standard far higher than the public imagines. According to the government’s own surveys, the typical “poor” American has cable or satellite TV, two color TVs, and a DVD player or VCR. He has air conditioning, a car, a microwave, a refrigerator, a stove, and a clothes washer and dryer. He is able to obtain medical care when needed. His home is in good repair and is not overcrowded. By his own report, his family is not hungry, and he had sufficient funds in the past year to meet his family’s essential needs. While this individual’s life is not affluent, it is far from the images of dire poverty conveyed by liberal activists and politicians.
Conventional accounts of poverty not only exaggerate hardship, they also underestimate government spending on the poor. In 2008, federal and state governments spent $714 billion (or 5 percent of the total economy) on means-tested welfare aid, providing cash, food, housing, medical care, and targeted social services to poor and low-income Americans. (This sum does not include Social Security or Medicare.)
If converted into cash, this aid would be nearly four times the amount needed to eliminate poverty in the U.S. by raising the incomes of all poor households above the federal poverty levels.