Well of course. If you start by defining poverty in relative terms (that is, poverty is a measure of inequality) then the only way you can reduce poverty is by reducing inequality.

This is a tautology.

The much more important question is should we be measuring poverty in this relative rather than in an absolute manner?

For example, inequality as measured by market incomes (ie, before tax and benefits) in the UK is now about the same as it was just before the Industrial Revolution (around the 0.5 mark both times).

Using purely a relative measurement of poverty (ie, inequality) we would now have to assume that the poor are as badly off as they were 250 years ago.

Which is, of course, arrant nonsense.

Interestingly, there is also increasing evidence that intervention in the economy by governments also has a negative impact on everyone, not just the richest.

CPAG is one of a numbe of organisations that focusses on relative, rather than absolute, poverty. Yet countries where governments interfere to try to equalise outcomes tend also to have higher rates of absolute poverty. I would much rather live in a society where people were unequally rich than one where they were equally poor.

The UNICEF report on wellbeing was therefore fundamentally flawed. It viewed inequality as inherently bad for a child’s welbeing. The UK was marked down for inequality, not for quality.

This fundamental bias serves those whose own interest require that “Poverty will always be with us”, but it leads to policies that prevent the poor from escaping absolute poverty.

I think it is not right when the executives of a charity are imploring everyone to donate for the children and at the same time, taking enormous salaries.

There must be more transparancy for this to work. The executives should be in it for the kids and NOT for the money:

http://www.squidoo.com/child-organizations