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poverty
noun [U] /ˈpɒv.ə.ti/
/ˈpɑː.vɚ.t̬i/ Definition
B2 the condition of being extremely poor: Two million people in the city live in abject (= very great) poverty. He emigrated to Australia to escape the grinding (= very great) poverty of his birthplace. Helping to alleviate poverty in developing countries also helps to reduce environmental destruction.Poverty and poor a poverty of sth formal › a lack of something or when the quality of something is extremely low: There is a disappointing poverty of creativity in their work.Scarce, inadequate and not enoughLacking things
(Definition of poverty noun from the Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary & Thesaurus
© Cambridge University Press)
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- Also, extra, and in addition
- Augmenting and supplementing
- Available and accessible
- Becoming and making smaller or less
- Becoming bigger
- Big and quite big
- Enlarging and inflating
- Enormous
- Enough
- Extremely small
- General words for size and amount
- Increasing and intensifying
- Large in number or quantity
- Masses and large amounts of things
- Maximum and minimum
- Medium-sized
- Merely and barely
- Plenty and abundant
- Small
- Small in number and quantity
- Some and quite
- Someone, anyone, no one or everyone
- Something, anything, nothing, and everything
- Things collected in lines or rings
- Things remaining
- Too much and unnecessary
- Unavailable and inaccessible
- Unlimited
- Words meaning small pieces and amounts
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SMART Thesaurus: Scarce, inadequate and not enough
Synonyms and related words:
- be at a premium idiom
- be thin on the ground idiom
- dearth noun
- deficiency noun
- deficient adjective
- insufficient adjective
- lack noun
- lack verb
- lacking adjective
- like gold dust idiom
- long on sth and short on sth idiom
- paltry adjective
- peanut noun (LITTLE MONEY)
- scant adjective
- scantily adverb
- scanty adjective
- scarce adjective
- scarcity noun
- shy adjective (LESS)
- starve verb
Word of the Day
spurn
to refuse to accept something or someone because you feel that they are not worth having
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