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The plague of poverty

Sarah Maslin: Brazil correspondent, The Economist, SÃO PAULO

The continuing fallout from covid-19 will swell the ranks of the global poor

IN 2021 POVERTY will rise to levels unseen in a decade and governments will struggle
to respond. The World Bank predicts that the pandemic will increase the ranks of the
extremely poor, on less than $1.90 a day, by up to 150m. From 1990 until 2019 their
numbers fell from 36% of the world’s population to 8%. Now they are increasing for the
first time since 1998. The UN says 240m-490m people in 70 countries will be pushed
into “multidimensional poverty”, a measure that includes lacking basic shelter or having
children go hungry.

Most of the newly destitute will be in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa. City-dwellers
will fare worse than the rural poor, because they cannot grow their own food and tend
to work in informal sectors that have been slow to recover (for example, as maids or
street vendors). Many saw their safeguards disappear in 2020. Remittances from family
members abroad stopped. Many sold assets such as jewellery. Millions will return to
their villages. Many children will leave school to go to work.