For policymakers and academics alike, having access to information about the global distribution of poverty is crucial. Based at the Earth Institute at Columbia University, The Poverty Mapping Project at The Center for International Earth Science Information Network is a very fine resource for anyone interested in this subject. Understandably, the site provides access to dozens of maps which...

In mid-June, UNICEF's Innocenti Research Center released a data report on child poverty in the industrialized world. The report offers statistics on the number of children in developed countries who live in relative and absolute poverty -- the first defined by living in a household with an income of below 50 percent of the national median, the second defined by the now 35-year-old formula first...