From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishthe poverty linethe poverty line (also the poverty level American English)PEW the income below which a person or a family is officially considered to be very poor and in need of help 20% of the population now live below the poverty line. → poverty
Examples from the Corpus
below the poverty line• Half the heads of households classified below the poverty line by federal standards can not read an eighth grade book.• Ten percent of the population of York lived in families with earnings below the poverty line.• New statistics hurled at us: 70 percent of our fellow citizens live below the poverty line.• Adult unemployment is estimated at 60 %, and 90 % of Gazans are said to live below the poverty line.• The villagers here are no exception to 70 per cent of the country's population who live below the poverty line.• When millions around the world are being killed in war, dying from starvation or living below the poverty line?• All three groups at that level earned incomes that were just at or below the poverty line for a family of four.• On the other hand, a third of the retired today live at or below the poverty line. 