Definition of "poverty" []

• The state of being poor; lack of the means of providing material needs or comforts. (noun)
• Deficiency in amount; scantiness: "the poverty of feeling that reduced her soul” ( Scott Turow). (noun)
• Unproductiveness; infertility: the poverty of the soil. (noun)
• Renunciation made by a member of a religious order of the right to own property. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "The species of poverty, most esteemed by Religion, is _poverty of mind_."
• "The Arabs say: '_God preserve us from overwhelming poverty; and from the company of him whom he loves not, namely, the infidel_': -- And there is a tradition of the prophet -- that '_poverty has a gloomy aspect in this world and in the next_!'""
• "Census Bureau figures indicate the number of Americans in poverty is the highest in more than half a century."