Demographic surveys and data could be used to assess programs and policies directly and indirectly concerned with the reduction of poverty, and, through the use of such survey data, to point to a number of population subgroupings which are or are not moving out of poverty. Annually collected Census Bureau facts, the basis of much of the analysis presented in this paper, can be used to make more intelligent program-decision progress in the war against poverty. These facts, organized in terms of age, family status and size, race, sex, region, work experience and occupations, etc., must have several of these variables combined in order to be practicable. Tables reporting age differences only, or white-nonwhite differences only, for example, tend to contribute spurious information for operating purposes. Furthermore such data must be studied in the form of time trends in order to detect degrees of progress for specific population categories. Topics covered in this paper include Special Hard-Core Poverty Groups, The Social Geography of Poverty, Family Size, and The Search for Causes and Solutions. (CH)