At least 40 percent of the individuals in extreme poverty areas live below the federal poverty line, defined as an annual income of $22,314 for a family of four. ..

In studying the effects of extreme poverty on education, the foundation found that in 2009, nearly 6.5 million children lived in households with incomes below 50 percent of the poverty threshold. The South accounted for nearly half of the nation‘s increase in extreme poverty, it found.