I 
114TH CONGRESS 
1ST SESSION 
H. R. 258 
To establish the Federal Interagency Working Group on Reducing Poverty 
which will create and carry out a national plan to cut poverty in America 
in half in ten years. 
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 
JANUARY 9, 2015 
Ms. LEE (for herself, Mr. HONDA, Ms. DELAURO, Ms. KAPTUR, Mr. YAR-
MUTH, Mr. RANGEL, Mr. NADLER, Mr. CONNOLLY, Mr. CARTWRIGHT, 
Mr. HASTINGS, Mr. JEFFRIES, Ms. KELLY of Illinois, Mr. GRIJALVA, Ms. 
SEWELL of Alabama, Mr. ELLISON, Mr. LANGEVIN, Ms. CHU of Cali-
fornia, Mr. POCAN, Mr. CICILLINE, Mr. CA´RDENAS, Mr. SERRANO, Mr. 
TONKO, Mr. THOMPSON of Mississippi, and Ms. SCHAKOWSKY) intro-
duced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Over-
sight and Government Reform 
A BILL 
To establish the Federal Interagency Working Group on Re-
ducing Poverty which will create and carry out a national 
plan to cut poverty in America in half in ten years. 
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Half in Ten Act of 
2015’’. 
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SEC. 2. FINDINGS. 
Congress finds the following: 
(1) The persistence of poverty, and especially 
intergenerational poverty, in America can be seen as 
a deep, structural problem that implicates our value 
system and our educational and economic institu-
tions. 
(2) Poverty may be defined as the lack of basic 
necessities of life such as food, shelter, clothing, 
health care, education, economic security, and eco-
nomic opportunity. 
(3) Policy initiatives and many safety net pro-
grams addressing poverty have not kept pace with 
the needs of millions of Americans. 
(4) The lack of an equitable distribution of 
housing choices across the country leads to isolation 
and concentrated poverty. 
(5) There were 45.3 million Americans living in 
poverty in 2013, consisting of 14.5 percent of the 
American people (U.S. Census Bureau, September 
2014). 
(6) Poverty has a disproportionate impact on 
minority communities in America with 27.2 percent 
of African-Americans, 23.5 percent of Hispanics, 
10.5 percent of Asian-Americans, and 9.6 percent of 
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Whites living in poverty in the United States in 
2013 (U.S. Census Bureau, September 2014). 
(7) In 2013 a family of 4 was considered poor 
under the U.S. Census Bureau’s official measure if 
the family’s income was below $22,834. 
(8) The economic consequences of poverty in 
the United States are estimated to be at least $500 
billion per year (Center for American Progress, 
2007). 
(9) Children who grow up in poverty experience 
higher crime rates, decreased productivity, and high-
er health costs over their lives (Center for American 
Progress, 2007). 
(10) 4,145,717 seniors lived in poverty in 2013 
(U.S. Census Bureau, 2014). 
(11) Young Americans, ages 18–24, experience 
a higher poverty rate than the national average 
(U.S. Census Bureau, 2014). 
(12) 15,769,921 children lived in poverty in 
2010 (U.S. Census Bureau, 2014). 
(13) Almost 38.31 percent of African-American 
children and over 32.26 percent of Hispanic children 
lived in poverty in 2009 (U.S. Census Bureau, 
2011). 
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(14) The 46,180,000 of Americans in poverty 
in 2010 was the largest number yet recorded in the 
52 years for which poverty estimates are available 
(U.S. Census Bureau, 2011). 
(15) Individuals and families in poverty are 
more socially vulnerable to natural disasters, ex-
treme weather and impacts of climate change and 
have greater difficulty preparing for, responding to 
and recovering from such events (Oxfam America, 
2009). 
(16) Children who live in families who fall into 
poverty for even short periods of time are at greater 
risk of a lifetime of lower earnings, lower edu-
cational attainment, and increased reliance on public 
services and increased rates of incarceration (First 
Focus, 2008). 
(17) It is estimated that the additional 3 mil-
lion children who were forced into poverty due to the 
recession of 2008, resulted in $35 billion in eco-
nomic losses annually, and will cause at least $1.7 
trillion in economic losses to the United States dur-
ing their lifetimes (First Focus, 2008). 
(18) Reducing poverty, especially child poverty, 
not only reduces costs for Federal, State, and local 
social services and benefits programs, but also in-
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creases tax revenue at all levels of government (Chil-
dren’s Defense Fund, 2009). 
(19) The House of Representatives, on January 
22, 2008, has resolved that it is the sense of Con-
gress that the United States should set a national 
goal of cutting poverty in half over the next 10 
years. 
SEC. 3. DEFINITIONS. 
In this Act: 
(1) FEDERAL
AGENCY.—The term ‘‘Federal 
agency’’ means any executive department, Govern-
ment corporation, Government-controlled corpora-
tion, or other establishment in the executive branch 
of the Government (including the Executive Office of 
the President), or any independent regulatory agen-
cy. 
(2) POVERTY.—The term ‘‘poverty’’ means an 
income level and living standard associated with and 
based on the official poverty measure as established 
and updated by the U.S. Census Bureau which es-
tablishes a threshold of minimum income necessary 
to achieve a standard of living free from deprivation 
of basic needs. 
(3) EXTREME POVERTY.—The term ‘‘extreme 
poverty’’ means having an income level or living 
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standard at a level of extreme deprivation based on 
living with income below 50 percent of the Federal 
poverty line as established by the U.S. Census. 
(4) NEAR POVERTY.—The term ‘‘near poverty’’ 
means having a level of household income below 200 
percent of the Federal poverty line. 
(5) CHILD
POVERTY.—The term ‘‘child pov-
erty’’ means poverty which impacts those persons 
under 18 years of age. 
(6) DEPRIVATION.—The term ‘‘deprivation’’ 
means lacking some or all basic human needs. 
(7) DECENT
LIVING
STANDARD.—The term 
‘‘decent living standard’’ means the amount of an-
nual income that would allow an individual to live 
beyond deprivation at a safe and decent, but modest, 
standard of living. 
(8) ALTERNATIVE
POVERTY
MEASURES.—The 
term ‘‘alternative poverty measures’’ means meas-
ures and indicators, other than the traditional in-
come based measure of poverty, which can provide a 
more detailed picture of the low-income and poverty 
stricken populations, such as the number of people 
who were kept above poverty by Government sup-
ports, the number of people who are poor due to 
medical expenses, child care, and work expenses, the 
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