of the poverty cycle in which some people moved in and out of absolute poverty during their lives. This idea of poverty circle captured important longitudinal aspects of poverty that were cited later in many other researches. Second York study (1936) Rowntree conducted a further study of poverty in York in 1936 under the title Poverty and Progress. This was based largely on a similar research method as his earlier study and found absolute poverty among the working class in York had decreased by 50% since his first study. However, as he changed his definition of the poverty line, and so the measure of absolute poverty, it is not a direct comparison from his earlier study. In this study he included allowances for some items which were not strictly necessary for survival, these included newspapers, books, radios, beer, tobacco, holidays, and presents. His results showed that the causes of poverty had changed considerably in a few decades. In the 1890s, the major reason for primary poverty was low wages, 52%, whereas in the 1930s unemployment accounted for 44.53% and low wages only 10%. Despite the inclusion of the extra items, he found that the percentage of his sample population in poverty had dropped to 18 per cent in 1936 and to 1.5 per cent in 1950. Third York study (1951) Rowntree published a third study of York's poverty in 1951 under the title Poverty and the Welfare State which was produced in collaboration with his research assistant G. R. Lavers. Unlike his other studies of York a sampling technique was used rather than a comprehensive survey, as he had primarily tested its viability in his second York study, though he did not adopt it in the previous time. By the 1950s, it appeared that absolute poverty was a minor problem although poverty did remain, for example among the elderly, but it was believed that increased welfare benefits would soon eradicate this lingering poverty. The conquest of poverty was put down to an expanding economy as the 1950s were the years of the 'affluent society', to government policies of full employment, and to the success of the welfare state. It was widely believed that the operation of the welfare state had redistributed wealth from rich to poor and significantly raised working class living standards. Other writings David Lloyd George urged Rowntree to write on rural living conditions in Britain: The Land