Income inequality is a problem that affects the whole world today, and Chile in particular. But the necessary and urgent discussion on how to reduce inequality should not make us forget all the progress made in the region and in Chile in terms of reducing extreme poverty (defined as the percentage of individuals living below the international poverty line of US$1.9 per day).

The graph from Our World in Data, which shows the evolution of this indicator over the last 40 years, is impressive. The countries of Latin America and the Caribbean went from having 14% of the population at that level to 4% in 2019. There are still many people living in extreme poverty, but the progress is undeniable.

In the case of Chile, the proportion fell from almost 8% in 1981 to 0.3% in 2019, according to Our World in Data.

One of the sad exceptions to this trend is Argentina, where extreme poverty has advanced from 0.7% in 1981 to almost 1.5% in 2019.

You can see all the figures and various analyses at https://ourworldindata.org/extreme-poverty-in-brief.