[lbo-talk] question on poverty and world bank's PPP

[Jeffrey Fisher]

ok, stupid question, but when the world bank says that (as of 1999, 
iirc) 2.1 billion people lived on less than $1/day using the dollar as 
a marker of "purchasing power parity", does that mean the buying power 
of US$1 no matter where you are in the world, or does it mean the local 
equivalent of what US$1 would buy in the states?

the former would be bad enough, and the latter seems impossibly small 
in certain cases, but i haven't found a clear explanation, anywhere.

thanks

j