Bangladesh has escaped extreme poverty, but seven in ten people still live on less than $8.30 a day

Introduction

By the World Bank’s international measure, extreme poverty in Bangladesh has nearly disappeared as a mass condition. The share of people living on less than $3.00 a day (in 2021 purchasing-power terms) fell from 25.1% in 2010 to 5.9% in 2022.¹ But that is the lowest of the World Bank’s three standard lines. On the line used for upper-middle-income countries, $8.30 a day, 71.5% of Bangladeshis were still poor in 2022.²

71.5%

Share of Bangladesh’s population living on less than $8.30 a day, 2022 (World Bank, 2021 PPP).

This article looks at what the three lines show together, how Bangladesh compares with its neighbours, and why the distribution of consumption, which has barely shifted, matters for the next stage of poverty reduction. All figures are survey-based estimates derived from Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS) Household Income and Expenditure Surveys and harmonised by the World Bank; survey years are 2010, 2016 and 2022.¹

Three lines, one story

The World Bank publishes poverty rates at several lines because a single threshold hides the population just above it. Between 2010 and 2022:

• At $3.00 a day, the rate fell 19.2 percentage points, from 25.1% to 5.9%.¹
• At $4.20 a day (the lower-middle-income line), it fell 31.6 points, from 52.1% to 20.5%.³
• At $8.30 a day (the upper-middle-income line), it fell 17.1 points, from 88.6% to 71.5%.²

The fall at the lowest line was steepest in relative terms, and the 2022 reading is the steepest drop between two consecutive surveys in the series: from 19.5% in 2016 to 5.9% in 2022, against a drop from 25.1% to 19.5% between 2010 and 2016.¹ Survey estimates for a single year should be read with care, particularly as consumer prices rose by 7.7% in 2022 and 9.9% and 10.5% in the next two years.⁴ The latest published household survey predates most of that price pressure, so it cannot show how families fared afterwards.

The gap between the lines is the point. Roughly 65.6 percentage points of the population, about two-thirds of Bangladeshis, sit between the $3.00 and $8.30 lines.¹² They are no longer in extreme poverty, but a modest shock, such as a price rise, an illness or a lost job, can push a household back below the lower lines.

Compared with neighbours

On the $8.30 line, Bangladesh’s 71.5% sits between India (80% in 2023) and Indonesia (64.1% in 2025). Sri Lanka (53.3% in 2019) and Nepal (52.7% in 2022) are lower, and Viet Nam, at 21.5% in 2022, is far lower.² Pakistan, at 87.1% in 2024, is higher.² Survey years differ, so this is an indicative ranking rather than a like-for-like league table. It does show that low extreme poverty is not the same as broad prosperity: Viet Nam’s share below $3.00 a day was 1.6% in 2022 (Bangladesh: 5.9%), but its share below $8.30 was less than a third of Bangladesh’s.¹²

Gains that have not changed the shares

Growth lifted most households’ consumption, but the way it is divided has barely changed. In 2000 the poorest fifth of the population accounted for 8.6% of household consumption; in 2022 it accounted for 8.8%.⁵ The richest fifth’s share eased from 42.7% to 40.1% over the same period, with the second, middle and fourth quintiles each gaining a little.⁵ The Gini index, which summarises inequality in consumption, was 33.4 in 2000 and 30.9 in 2022.⁶

Two caveats apply. First, these are shares of consumption measured in household surveys, which typically understate the top of the income distribution, so they are not measures of wealth. Second, a stable share means the poorest fifth’s consumption grew about as fast as the average, which is itself positive, but it has not closed the distance with richer households.

What it will take

Because the survey-based evidence points to a large, near-poor majority rather than a small, extremely poor minority, the policy questions shift. Options consistent with the evidence above include:

• Protect the near-poor, not only the poorest. Social protection that reaches only households below the lowest lines would miss most of the roughly 65.6% of the population living between $3.00 and $8.30 a day, who are exposed to price and health shocks.
• Keep prices stable. With inflation above 7% in 2022 and near 10% in 2023 and 2024, real consumption can erode quickly for households with little saving.⁴
• Measure more often. The latest household survey is from 2022; more frequent, comparable surveys would let policymakers see whether the gains have held through the recent price pressure.
• Aim at the poorest fifth’s share. With a share unchanged since 2000, targeted transfers, jobs for women and young people, and affordable health and education are the levers that move the bottom of the distribution, not average growth alone.