The Pros And Cons Of Relative Poverty

Poverty is multifaceted, and often hard to define. Its definitions consist of objective and subjective components, which, when trying to address, present a series of challenging debates. For simplicity, however, poverty can be defined in one of two ways; absolute poverty and relative poverty. Grounded in the idea of destitution, absolute poverty refers to when a person lacks the vital resources needed to maintain a healthy existence (Spicker et al., 2017). Access to clean water, sufficient food, and shelter, for example, are all considered essential elements of human life. Relative poverty, on the other hand, defines poverty in relation to the deprivation of the agreed living standards, set to a specific society, at a particular time (Alcock, 2016). Although humans must fulfill similar biological requirements, it is argued that human need tends to vary, both within, and across, societies. What is considered as a luxury to some, for example, may be considered as essential to others. Arguably the most influential theory on relative poverty is that of Peter Townsend (1979) who, in his pioneering work ‘Poverty in the UK’, defined relative poverty as;

“Individuals, families, and groups in the population can be said to be in poverty when they lack the

Perhaps the most influential structural theory is the Class Conflict theory by Karl Marx. In his theory, Marx argues that a free-market capitalist society is exploitive and oppressive towards the working-class. According to Marx, the working class, known as proletariat, are rewarded with little more than sustenance wages, which only increases and perpetuates poverty. Contrastingly, however, the capitalist owners, through this exploitation, are able to generate high surplus profits and retain the majority of the wealth for