These words describe people who are unable to obtain sufficient money or possessions to ensure them a decent standard of living. Poor is the most general term and is applied to those who live in more or less constant poverty, or to anything characterized by or resulting from poverty: poor seasonal workers; poor housing; a poor neighbourhood. Poor is often a derogatory term pointing at the squalor, ignorance and immorality believed to exist among those who do not have enough money.

Underprivileged is a euphemism employed by social scientists, welfare workers and journalists to describe the children of poor parents. The word is vaguely and categorically applied to those who, because of economic oppression and illiteracy, are deprived of many of the basic necessities (such as adequate food, clothing, shelter, recreational facilities and medical care) that most people take for granted as rights. Hard up is a colloquial term for poor . But to be hard up often implies only a temporary shortage of money rather than a state of permanent need. People who are hard up are not poor in the accepted sense of the word: so hard up before pay day that he had to borrow money for lunch; farmers hard up because of a crop failure.

Lower-class is used to describe that group of people occupying the lowest social and economic level in any society that has either a long-established caste system or one of class distinctions based on occupation, education and income. People who are lower-class tend more often than not to be poor , but the term is frequently used nowadays in an unfavourable and snobbish way to suggest those with lack of ambition, crude manners and low educational attainments, whether at a financial disadvantage or not.

Unemployable refers to people who for various reasons are unable to work at any job or remunerative occupation. It may be used of young people, especially poor ones, who have been so handicapped in the learning process that they cannot be trained for useful employment. In a wider sense, people who are unemployable may be those of advanced age or those who have physical and mental disabilities which prevent them from working.