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“The poverty indicators in our state are just numbers, they offer no real understanding about the matter of state in our society,” ethnographer Hranush Kharatyan told a press conference on Friday, while speaking of the newly released “Social snapshot and Poverty in Armenia, 2016” report.

To note, according to the National Statistical Service (NSS) report, the 2015 poverty rate in Armenia estimates 29.8 percent which is by 0,2 percentage points lower than in 2014.

To Kharatyan’s assessment, the NSS report provides neither quality analysis of the poverty line nor its severity and deepness.

“If, for example, an individuals or families are "poor" if their poverty threshold falls below 41,000 AMD amount, does it mean those you earn, for example, 42,000 AMD are not considered “poor” or the pensioner, who gets a pension worth 50,000 AMD? To my assessment, two thirds of our society live in real poverty,” Kharatyan said.

The ethnographer pointed out to the mentality of the respondents. “It appears that people living in the dire conditions do not subjectively consider themselves as poor, which is mostly conditioned by the mentality. Being a poor is perceived to be a shame. This is the shortcoming of the qualitative research. People call poor those who are striving to earn their daily bread, are hungry, and have no shelter. Those who eat potato and cabbage all the year around are not classified as poor but are referred to the middle class, since they do not ask others for a bread,” Kharatyan noted.

Sociologist Aharon Adibekyan, present at the discussion, referred to his own research that has revealed that one third of the small and middle sized business in Armenia does not operate or simply closed. The data suggest that the number of the middle class representatives who have barely lived and offered jobs to others has significantly decreased.
 
Both speakers doubted the reliability of the indicators used by the NSS for poverty measurement.