Why child poverty claims are all over the place

MSD has helpfully produced a table that shows the extreme variability of official child poverty measures:

Depending on what political barrow is being pushed, the highest or lowest number can be selected.

The highest number - 341,000 - represents children living in homes under 60% of the median equivalised household income after housing costs. The lowest number - 65,000 - represents children living in severe material hardship experiencing eight or more specific deprivations.

Of interest the higher number has increased recently; the lower has decreased calling into question the relationship between the two.

The paper usefully goes on to point out:

Are all children in low-income households experiencing material hardship?
• No.
• The overlap between those in low-income households and those experiencing material hardship is considerably less than 100%, and the actual overlap depends on the measures being compared.

So next time you hear UNICEF for instance talking about one in three children in Aoteroa living in poverty you'll have some context to make sense of the claim.