The Poverty Line Is a Lie: What That Means for Our Community
This past week, this article has been making the rounds among staff at the Port Angeles Food Bank:
Part 1: My Life Is a Lie. How a Broken Benchmark Quietly Broke America. Link to the full article here: https://www.yesigiveafig.com/p/part-1-my-life-is-a-lie?utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
It’s long, and a bit hard to follow if you don’t live in the world of finance, so I broke it down into chewable pieces and connected it to the work we do, I hope you enjoy. Quotes from the actual article will be highlighted in red.
Most of us grow up believing that the “poverty line” is a meaningful measure of who is struggling. It sounds official, scientific, and precise — a clean line between people who “need help” and those who are supposedly doing fine. But as this writer recently explained, the poverty line is built on an outdated formula from the early 1960s. It reflects a world that no longer exists.
And because we still use that old formula today, our country vastly underestimates how many people are struggling to meet their basic needs.
At the Port Angeles Food Bank, we see the consequences of that misunderstanding every day.
Why the Poverty Line Is Failing Us
In 1963, experts decided to define poverty by taking the cost of a very minimal food plan (essentially the cheapest diet a family could survive on) and multiplying it by three. Back then, the average family spent about one-third of their income on food. The formula made a rough kind of sense.
“For 1963, that floor made sense. Housing was relatively cheap. A family could rent a decent apartment or buy a home on a single income, as we’ve discussed. Healthcare was provided by employers and cost relatively little (Blue Cross coverage averaged $10/month). Childcare didn’t really exist as a market—mothers stayed home, family helped, or neighbors (who likely had someone home) watched each other’s kids. Cars were affordable, if prone to breakdowns. With few luxury frills, the neighborhood kids in vo-tech could fix most problems when they did. College tuition could be covered with a summer job. Retirement meant a pension income, not a pile of 401(k) assets you had to fund yourself.
Orshansky’s food-times-three formula was crude, but as a crisis threshold—a measure of “too little”—it roughly corresponded to reality. A family spending one-third of its income on food would spend the other two-thirds on everything else, and those proportions more or less worked. Below that line, you were in genuine crisis. Above it, you had a fighting chance.
But everything changed between 1963 and 2024.”
But here’s the problem:
Food is no longer one-third of a household’s budget.
“Housing costs exploded. Healthcare became the largest household expense for many families. Employer coverage shrank while deductibles grew. Childcare became a market, and that market became ruinously expensive. College went from affordable to crippling. Transportation costs rose as cities sprawled and public transit withered under government neglect.
The labor model shifted. A second income became mandatory to maintain the standard of living that one income formerly provided. But a second income meant childcare became mandatory, which meant two cars became mandatory. Or maybe you’d simply be “asking for a lot generationally speaking” because living near your parents helps to defray those childcare costs.
The composition of household spending transformed completely. In 2024, food-at-home is no longer 33% of household spending. For most families, it’s 5 to 7 percent.
Housing now consumes 35 to 45 percent. Healthcare takes 15 to 25 percent. Childcare, for families with young children, can eat 20 to 40 percent.
If you keep Orshansky’s logic—if you maintain her principle that poverty could be defined by the inverse of food’s budget share—but update the food share to reflect today’s reality, the multiplier is no longer three.
It becomes sixteen.”
Today, food often accounts for 10% or less of a family’s expenses. The real budget-breakers are housing, childcare, healthcare, and transportation — none of which were central to the original equation. Yet we still use the same formula to determine the poverty line.
If we updated the poverty formula using today’s actual cost of living — real rent, real childcare, real healthcare — the income needed for a family of four to meet basic needs wouldn’t be around $31,200 (the current federal poverty guideline for a family of 4).
It would be closer to $130,000–$150,000.
That means countless families who don’t “count” as poor are still living with very real instability.
The Hidden Middle: Working Hard, Still Struggling
The article refers to the “The Valley of Death” as a space where families earn too much to qualify for help, but not enough to live without constant financial strain. In the social services world, we refer to these people as:
ALICE
Asset
Limited
Income
Constrained
Employed
They make more than the federal poverty level, but not enough to actually get by. They get kicked off their benefits because they make too much, then end up taking home LESS than they were when they got assistance because now they are paying market price for things like health insurance and childcare.
“Our entire safety net is designed to catch people at the very bottom, but it sets a trap for anyone trying to climb out. As income rises from $40,000 to $100,000, benefits disappear faster than wages increase.”
“This is the breaker. The family works harder. They get promoted to $65,000. They are now solidly “Working Class.”
But at roughly this level, childcare subsidies vanish. They must now pay the full market rate for daycare.
Income Gain: +$20,000 (from $45k)
Expense Increase: +$28,000 (jumping from co-pays to full tuition)
Net Result: Total collapse.
When you run the net-income numbers, a family earning $100,000 is effectively in a worse monthly financial position than a family earning $40,000.
At $40,000, you are drowning, but the state gives you a life vest. At $100,000, you are drowning, but the state says you are a “high earner” and ties an anchor to your ankle called “Market Price.””
These families might look “middle class” from the outside. They’re working full-time. Their kids are in sports. They have a car. Maybe two.
But behind that image, budgets are stretched to the breaking point by:
rent increases
daycare bills that rival a mortgage
medical expenses
car repairs
rising insurance premiums
grocery prices that change weekly
One unexpected bill — a broken transmission, an ER visit, a landlord raising rent — can collapse an already fragile balance.
Yet because they’re above the official poverty line, these families often don’t qualify for any support. They’re told they’re “fine.” They’re told they’re “not poor.” They’re told to “budget better.”
What we see in response to this is anger and fingers being pointed in the wrong direction. The stigma and shame that is directed at people who use the food bank is completely misplaced.
“The family earning $65,000—the family that just lost their subsidies and is paying $32,000 for daycare and $12,000 for healthcare deductibles—is hyper-aware of the family earning $30,000 and getting subsidized food, rent, childcare, and healthcare.
They see the neighbor at the grocery store using an EBT card while they put items back on the shelf. They see the immigrant family receiving emergency housing support while they face eviction.
They are not seeing “poverty.” They are seeing people getting for free the exact things that they are working 60 hours a week to barely afford.”
This is why breaking this stigma is so important to us. The shame, stigma, and stereotypes about people who use the food bank negatively impact those who use us AND those who don’t. They point the blame towards the people who have access to the benefits instead of the people creating a system that benefits only the rich, suffocates the middle class, and cashes in on the sufferings of those below the “actual” poverty line.
The truth is that the federal poverty guideline hasn’t changed because it’s convenient. It signals to average Americans and the rest of the world: “Look! Most of households make around $100,000 a year! Our economy is booming!” While quietly ignoring the fact that $100,000 barely covers the basic necessities to live.
Using a formula from 1963 to measure poverty is like using a rotary phone to check your Instagram account.
We’ve been talking about this at the food bank for years. This is why we have a no-barrier policy, because the income limits don’t reflect reality anymore. We won’t turn someone away for “making too much” when what they make is not enough to keep food on the table. We are here to help EVERYONE who needs us, even if, on paper, they look like they’re doing alright. We know the truth.
What This Means for a Food Bank
When we talk about food insecurity, it’s easy to imagine a small, well-defined group of people who need help. But that picture is wrong.
At the food bank, we meet people every week who:
work full-time
have college degrees
own homes
have professional jobs
have never asked for help before
They come through our doors embarrassed, believing they’ve made a personal mistake. But they haven’t. They’re simply living in an economy where the math no longer adds up — and where our national poverty measure no longer tells the truth.
People don’t come to the food bank because they’ve failed. They come because the system has.
Food is the one expense we can help ease. When someone receives groceries from us, it’s not just food they’re being given. It’s breathing room. It’s a little extra money for rent. Childcare. Medication. Gas. Stability.
We serve people in crisis — but we also serve people who are working hard, doing everything “right,” and still struggling because the poverty line has not kept pace with real life.
Stigma Doesn’t Belong Here
When the poverty line hides the truth, people start to believe the lie that needing help is a moral failure, a lack of effort, a sign that someone is “less than.”
But what if we stopped thinking of poverty as a fixed line and started seeing it for what it really is — a wide band of instability that captures millions of working Americans?
If we understood poverty that way, food banks wouldn’t be seen as the last stop for the “poor.”
They would be understood for what they truly are: stabilizers for everyday families navigating an unstable economy.
A Call to Awareness and Action
As we continue to serve this community, we hope more people will understand this simple truth: You don’t have to be “poor” to need help.
You just have to be human in a system that no longer supports basic living.
And the more we talk openly about that — the more we challenge old definitions, fight stigma, and advocate for updated measures of economic hardship — the more we can build a community where no one is ashamed to ask for the support they deserve.
Food banks are not a symbol of brokenness.
They are a sign of a community choosing to take care of its own, especially when the systems built to protect people no longer do.
The author posted a follow up article today, for those who are intent on criticizing the conclusions drawn. You may find it enlightening. https://www.yesigiveafig.com/p/part-2-the-door-has-opened?r=57oaoq&utm_medium=ios&triedRedirect=true