Stereotypes and Statistics: An Essay on Public Opinion and Poverty Measurement.

Both the public perception of poverty and the measurement of poverty intersect in ways in which neither area of study is fully aware. That is, some research focuses on the public's opinion of the poor and of welfare recipients, and other research examines poverty. measurement and how its variants determine whom we consider to be poor in the U.S.; but relatively little work has explored, either conceptually or empirically, the intersection of these two fields. This essay aims to do just that. After presenting a general summary of these two topics, I propose how each offers new perspectives for the other. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]