Trump administration seeks to redefine formula for calculating poverty

[Borealis]

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/07/us/politics/trump-poverty-level-proposal.html

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration is proposing regulatory changes that could result in cuts in federal aid to millions of low-income Americans.

The proposal by the Office of Management and Budget on Monday would change how inflation is used to calculate the official definition of poverty used by the Census Bureau to estimate
the size of the country’s poor population. The measure is also often applied to determine eligibility for government benefits.

Lowering estimates of the inflation rate could mean that the poverty level would rise at a slower rate, resulting in fewer families and individuals able to qualify for food assistance like the
Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, health assistance like Medicaid and other government programs.

The official poverty measure compares cash income, before taxes, against a threshold that is set at three times the cost of a minimum food diet in 1963. In 2016, the official poverty
measure was 12.7 percent, which meant that 40.6 million Americans were considered to be living in poverty.

A senior administration official said that preventing low-income families from gaining access to government programs was not the intended goal. The official, who declined to comment
on the record because the proposed change is still in a public comment period, noted that it has been 40 years since the inflation measure was tweaked.

[Clovis]

if (lowestIncome < Trump.wealth) {
notPoor();
} else {
evenNotPoorer();
}

[Sableye]

Eat the Rich

[elix]

Can't get in trouble for failing to look after the poor if you don't call anyone poor.

[Clovis]

I'm not poor, I'm just monetarily challenged.

[Judas]

He's been on a fucking roll this month

[revengeanomics]

Is it gonna be "if they have any health, they are filthy rich"?

[_maverick_]

"You live in America, therefore you can't be poor because you're LIVING the AMERICAN DREAM!"

HUNDREDS OF NATIONS APPLAUD TRUMP AS AMERICA'S POVERTY RATING DROPS TO 0.0% IN SINGLE TWITTER POST!

TRUMP AWARDED ALL NOBLE PRIZES FOR EVERYTHING FOREVER

[DrBones]

If you have access to a refrigerator and running water, you aren't poor! Please ignore that this covers literally everyone except the guy from Into The Wild.

[RaikohZX]

no one's poor when everyone's rich on life
except tom, don't mind his starved corpse behind the trash bin

[CyclonatorZ]

Pull yourself up by your bootstraps, dumbass.

[Jaguar]

Reducing poverty by redefining it

Galaxy brain level thinking

[Peachy]

Ay bru your function doesn't return anything or reference and object to quantify

How is it supposed to classify people

[Hruhf]

It would be hilarious if Trump decided the cut off and set it to something he felt was super poor.
And then 99% of Americans are suddenly deemed to be in poverty.

[elix]

He'd finally deliver on his promise of lowering taxes for the (former) middle-class... who've now been redefined to be so far under the poverty level they don't have to pay income tax, along with basically everyone but the 1%.

Then you'd really see things fall apart.

[Clovis]

Trump's using global variables because he's shit at C++.

[G-Man]

Fuck off.

I even have a colleague who shares this sentiment. And he is from Denmark.

[smurfy]

If you earn less than Trump you are just lazy. If you earn more than him you are probably a liar or possibly a criminal, Congress should investigate!