By Li Ying & Li Fan, Research Team on “Social Justice and Relevant Issues at Relative Poverty Stage”, China Development Research Foundation

Research Report, No.143, 2020 (Total 5887) 2020-6-15

Abstract: Relative poverty will become the major issue for poverty alleviation work in the post-2020 period and accordingly we need to define a threshold for evaluating relative poverty. This paper notes that differentiated relative poverty thresholds need to be made respectively in urban and rural areas. 40% of the median disposable income of urban residents could be used as urban relative poverty threshold and 50% of median disposable income of rural residents as rural relative poverty threshold. Since China entered the brackets of middle income countries in the world, the relative poverty rate across the country has maintained relatively stable; the overall poverty rate in 2018 was 12.6% with urban rate standing at 6.0% and rural areas at 22.3% respectively; the aggregate poverty population is about 176 million with 49.81 million in urban areas and 126 million in rural areas. On comparable basis, China’s relative poverty rate is generally higher than those high-income OECD member countries whereas the figure equals to those of mid-to-high-income countries, which is roughly in line with features of economic development at present stage. During the phase of relative poverty period, China is faced with a dual challenge imposed by a huge scale of rural population in poverty and an increasing number of poor people in urban areas. We need to make adjustments toward the targeted group of people and the goal and measures in poverty alleviation effort. In the meantime, we need to promote the integrated development of rural and urban areas and strive to narrow the gap between rural and urban areas.

Keywords: relative poverty, threshold, poverty scale, international comparison