poverty and social exclusion are interlinked with inequality but cannot be reduced to inequalities of income alone sen poverty is a situation in which inequalities leave some people so far away from the social mainstream that the deprivations they experience push them below what are viewed as basic standards in practice poverty is often operationalized and measured in terms of income or consumption poverty poverty lines can be defined on the basis of absolute needs eg the cost of a minimum food basket plus an allowance for basic nonfood basic needs or on relative social standards that prevail in a given society at a given time one of the main sources of dissatisfaction with absolute poverty measures is that they ignore concerns about relative deprivation shame and social exclusion ravallion