Basic needs budgets in policy and practice

This chapter takes up the history and development of standard “basic needs” budgets in the US. It explains in detail why the focus remains only on basic survival needs in the US context. It also points out how basic needs budgets are largely left to state governments and their agencies in order to develop family budget standards for their state in the absence of national action by the federal government. The chapter illustrates the overwhelming lack of economic security and social protection in the US, which caused many households to struggle in coping with incomes below the most basic of living standards. It mentions a new poverty line that comprises of an allowance for food, clothing, and shelter, which would be updated annually based on changes in the consumption of necessities by a reference group of families in the general population.