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MisterBilau t1_isnxddw wrote

"includes deprivations in exactly four indicators: nutrition, cooking fuel, sanitation and housing. "
Well, if that's the bar, that's not saying much. Most westerners would still consider the majority of those 415 million "poor". Having a hut, firewood, a latrine and some food does not mean not being poor. Sure, maybe 415 million are now not poor... by 19th century standards.

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rogueblades t1_isoarmp wrote

its the difference between relative poverty and absolute poverty.

Because westerners (even relatively impoverished westerners) enjoy a standard of living which is hard to fathom, these significant gains don't look like much to western onlookers.

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KaifiAzmiGhost t1_iso772f wrote

True. Though, IMO, we have come a long way from setting up the country from scratch after centuries of the British, French and Portuguese colonialism, riddled with anxieties over food security, fighting one war with China (we lost) and four wars with Pakistan (all won), plenty of economic sanctions laid by USA over nuclear tests in 1998 (albeit lifted within a year) to here.

Sure, we can improve much more.

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PM_ME_YUR_BIG_SECRET t1_iso7v5n wrote

I have been jaded about "poor vs not poor" since an episode of West Wing where they were talking about raising the poverity line to adjust for inflation and someone was like "you can't do that, that would make a million people 'poor' overnight." And then the discussion was about how the standard of living wouldn't have changed, just the cut off (and it's political implications). Anyway, I imagine India is getting better in that regard, but having a sharp cutoff between poverty and not is hard to judge.

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