The issue of world poverty was once dominated by number-crunching development economists and worthy aid organisations, but in recent years the likes of Bono and Bob Geldof have made it a sexy subject. In July 2005, hundreds of actors, musicians and celebrities performed at ‘Live 8’ concerts around the world in order to hold the G8 to UN Millennium Development Goal 1.A - a commitment to halve the number of people living on less than $1 a day by 2015. So what happened to ‘Make Poverty History’? China has reduced its population in poverty from 452m to 278m. China, Brazil, and South Africa are now aid givers. But sub-Saharan Africa has made barely any progress. Adrian Lovett, director of the anti-poverty movement One, fears it may become even more difficult as money that could be going to Africa is poured into European bank bailouts. Poverty ‘over there’ may be less of a worry than poverty ‘over here’.

In the UK, child poverty is said to affect one in three children, one of the highest rates in the developed world. In the US, where the poverty level is set at a yearly income of $23,050 for a family of four, 12.2 per cent of Americans lived in poverty in 2000, and 15.1 per cent in 2011. The majority of Americans can expect to spend at least one year of their lives below the poverty line. Shocking images of Americans living in tent cities, even storm drains, have become familiar. While this is of course shocking, some detect a certain schadenfreude about what happens when a society commits itself to the bottom line of material advancement. Should we care about those who try but don’t make it anywhere? And is it fair to expect much interest in global poverty when some feel charity begins at home?

Poverty is relative, as indicated by the different definition in the West. And some feel inequality is the real injustice, that the poor are condemned to stay poor because the rich have pulled the ladders of social mobility up behind them, with CEOs paid hundreds of times more than the immigrant labourers cleaning their toilets. Would we make a real step towards abolishing poverty if we ironed out the differences between people first, and created a fairer society rather than worrying about creating a richer society? And is putting the spotlight on the very poorest people in the world something of a luxury for the relatively well-off in the developed world, too far-sighted to notice the poverty on their doorsteps? Or is it a moral imperative for us all if we are to create a truly equal world? Is concern for poverty, at home or abroad, just liberal hand-wringing? Can poverty ever be history?