The poor will always be with us, but who are the poor? Kitty Holland looks at how different definitions give different answers
The measurement of poverty has always been controversial and intensely political - and the authors of the long-awaited Monitoring Poverty Trends In Ireland: Results From the 2001 Living In Ireland Survey admit as much themselves.
Although the report, published yesterday by the ESRI - the Economic and Social Research Institute - makes clear that the proportion of the population in "consistent poverty" has fallen dramatically between 1994 and 2001 - from 15 per cent to 5 per cent of households - the overwhelming impression one gets from its complex graphs and various measurement indicators is of a significant rise in "relative poverty".
It is "striking", say the authors, how increasingly at risk of relative poverty are key sections of the population, most notably older people, especially older women, the chronically ill or disabled and those tied to the home such as single mothers.
These groups are more and more finding themselves "stuck" in poverty and, unable to access the labour market, are those most dependent on social welfare.
While "consistent poverty" is defined as being on a low income and having to go without such basics as a warm winter coat and adequate heating for the home, "relative poverty" is to live in a household whose income falls below thresholds set at 40 per cent, 50 per cent or 60 per cent of either average or median incomes.
If median income - the midpoint on the income scale, with equal numbers on greater incomes above and on smaller incomes below - is taken as a benchmark line, the ESRI records an increase every year between 1994 and 2001 in the proportion of those living on an income less than 50 per cent of this, 60 per cent of this and 70 per cent of this.
Most dramatically, the proportion of those falling below the 50 per cent median income line has more than doubled from 6 per cent in 1994 to 12.9 per cent in 2001.
The finding in the Monitoring Poverty report that relative income poverty has been increasing consistently and substantially is important, indicating as it does that those falling behind are falling further and further adrift of the rest of society.
"Thus whatever about trends in the extent of income poverty, there can be no doubting that its depth has been increasing and the disparity between the poor and the non-poor has been widening over time.
This conclusion," the report says, "is robust across measures and across income lines."
The Government, and especially the Minister for Social and Family Affairs, Ms Coughlan, will, however, no doubt seize upon one finding in particular.
In chapter three, the authors look at what has been happening to incomes in real terms - i.e. incomes adjusted for inflation or individual buying power.
Looking at the proportion falling below 40 per cent of the mean income in 1994 - adjusted each year only in line with inflation - they find relative income poverty by this measure decreasing, from 5.2 per cent in 1994, to 1 per cent in 2001.
The proportion falling below 60 per cent of this line has fallen most dramatically from 30.4 per cent to 6.3 per cent in the same period.
"This analysis demonstrates the manner in which real incomes have improved over this period across the population," write the authors.
However, while buying power has increased, this measure does "not reflect the relative nature of poverty".
Citing the Government's own 1997 National Anti-Poverty Strategy (NAPS), the authors point out relative poverty is predicated on "current norms and expectations".
And relative poverty does matter.
Although anxious not to ignore the enormous strides taken in reducing consistent poverty by more than 10 per cent of households between 1994 and 2001, one of the report's authors, Christopher Whelan, insists that importantly, not being in poverty meant a life of dignity.
"It means being able to participate in society with dignity and without shame. What is deemed necessary to do this changes over time," he says.
So, as incomes across the board increase, so too do the expectations of society in general of what individuals should have to be able to take part, "with dignity and without shame".
Not being able to participate means a day-to-day life of economic brinkmanship, constant strain, a sense of despair, not feeling in control of one's destiny, of psychological distress, said Mr Whelan.
Indeed the report looks at stress levels and, using a recognised threshold above which respondents were classified as suffering from "psychological distress", it finds the rates increased from 11.9 per cent among the "non-poor" to 39.3 per cent among the "consistently poor".
There are also important implications for society in general, and not just the poor, of the increasing rich-poor gap, Mr Whelan points out.
"There's the question of increased crime levels, demands on the health and social services and of social breakdown."
At a press briefing on social welfare increases last week, the Minister, Ms Coughlan, defended the low increase in child benefit of €6 to €8 a month - and the ungenerous increases - of €10 a week - in other supplementary welfare allowances on the grounds that these increases were well ahead of inflation.
These small increases put the Government further behind its own National Anti-Poverty Strategy targets and makes it increasingly unlikely these targets will be met next year.
The ESRI is clearly saying this is not enough and describes as a "real worry" the trend which sees those increasingly "stuck" in relative poverty being cut further adrift from what might be considered "reasonable".
The authors raise issues about how poverty is measured and employ complex indicators to give as broad an overview as possible of what is happening among Ireland's increasing population of poor and the deprived.
Sifting through them, the overwhelming conclusion may be clichéd but is true - the Celtic Tiger, notwithstanding, the rich are getting richer and the poor poorer and Government policies seem determined to perpetuate the trend.