Poverty today is a major global issue. Although there are all kinds of definitions used to explain it, in simple words, it means the inability of a person to even get his basic needs of food, shelter, clothing, safe drinking water, health and education. Poverty can be found in each and every corner of the world, although the causes may differ from country to country. Given below are the main causes of poverty in the world today. Overpopulation is one of the main causes behind the threatening of poverty on an individual level as well as a social level. This is simple math. If there are more mouths to feed and less income, definitely much will remain poor. Another theory which is used as an explanation for poverty is lack of education. If you look at any of the underdeveloped countries, you will find that the level of education there is very low. Lack of education means lack of employment opportunities, thus leading to unemployment coupled with poverty in the future. Moving away from one’s own homeland to another city or country in search of employment leads to poverty too. It may take these people a lot of time to find jobs. Meanwhile they live in bad conditions. The cost of living in the city or country is most of the time too high for them. There may be other causes of poverty like the change in business. For example, in America, a couple of decades ago, heavy industry flourished , which employed a lot of African-American people. But now, the focus is more on information technology and health care, both of which employ only skilled and trained people. This has led to unemployment among African-Americans. Poverty has many ill effects on society. That’s why steps should be taken to get rid of it! 小题1:What’s the meaning of the underlined word “flourished” in Paragraph 5? (No more than 5 words) 小题2:Why is overpopulation a cause of poverty today?  (No more than12 words) 小题3:What’s the situation of education in underdeveloped countries?  (No more than 8 words) 小题4:What does the passage mainly talk about?   (No more than 10 words) 小题5:In your opinion, what’s the most significant cause of poverty today? Please give your reason.  (No more than 25 words)