How to Use impoverish in a Sentence

impoverish

verb
  • Poor farming practices impoverished the soil.
  • The dictator enriched himself but impoverished his people.
  • What is certain is that the fires are newly impoverishing the farmers whose crops have been lost.
    — Washington Post, 8 June 2019
  • Impoverished renters have been hit the hardest, paying a rising share of their income for housing.
    — idahostatesman, 16 May 2017
  • They were impoverished; their world had imploded.
    — Mikhail Zygar, Air Mail, 6 Dec. 2025
  • To take three thousand pounds from the fortune of their dear little boy would be impoverishing him to the most dreadful degree.
    — Literary Hub, 16 Mar. 2026
  • Awarding damages for mere mistakes would impoverish debate, the court ruled.
    — The Economist, 18 Mar. 2021
  • Free trade enriches many investors by a small margin but impoverishes some workers by a large one.
    — Z. John Zhang, Fortune, 28 Nov. 2025
  • Some have, of course, warned that virtual reality can only impoverish our sense of the world.
    — Jacob Brogan, Slate Magazine, 1 Sep. 2017
  • That a short-term judgment about what the market will bear can choke off a literary legacy and, to some extent, impoverish a culture.
    — Mark Athitakis, The Atlantic, 10 Oct. 2024
  • Be careful that you are not being convinced to impoverish yourself merely to enrich someone else.
    — Virginia Hammerle, Dallas News, 15 Mar. 2020
  • In the Caribbean by providence impoverished In squalor, grow up to be a hero and a scholar?
    — Kirby Adams, The Courier-Journal, 4 June 2019
  • Are a wave of subpoenas about to impoverish thousands of bitcoin miners across New York, and the globe?
    — David Z. Morris, Fortune, 12 Feb. 2020
  • Both were married at 17 years of age and struggled to build a life in a country impoverished by British colonialism.
    — Kalpana Jain, Christian Science Monitor, 19 Sep. 2025
  • Chega campaigned promising higher salaries and better conditions for workers, who the party said had been impoverished by a greedy elite.
    — Emma Bubola, New York Times, 21 Mar. 2024
  • Iranians have grown increasingly impoverished over the last few years.
    — Amir Ahmadi Arian, The Dial, 15 Jan. 2026
  • Billy, as he was known, was also twenty, and also impoverished, uprooted, and lonely.
    — Kathryn Schulz, The New Yorker, 7 Apr. 2017
  • The harsh terms of the treaty purportedly embittered and impoverished the Germans.
    — Victor Davis Hanson, National Review, 25 July 2019
  • Though impoverished by war, the country has also developed an impressive defense-tech sector.
    — Niall Ferguson, The Atlantic, 10 Dec. 2024
  • But this approach cannot be allowed to impoverish government, nor should the funds be permitted to bankroll destructive business strategies.
    — Mariana Mazzucato, Foreign Affairs, 2 Oct. 2020
  • Silencing us impoverishes the whole world.
    — Glenn Garner, Deadline, 17 Sep. 2025
  • Silencing us impoverishes the whole world.
    — Bethy Squires, Vulture, 20 Sep. 2025
  • Silencing us impoverishes the whole world.
    — Katie Kilkenny, HollywoodReporter, 3 Sep. 2019
  • Silencing us impoverishes the whole world.
    — Amanda Castro shane Croucher anna Commander, MSNBC Newsweek, 18 Sep. 2025
  • Extra protection for even the shortest snippets will impoverish the public sphere by discouraging the sharing of news.
    — Glyn Moody, Ars Technica, 12 June 2018
  • Niger relies heavily on foreign aid and sanctions could further impoverish its more than 25 million people.
    — Sam Mednick, The Christian Science Monitor, 3 Aug. 2023
  • As the largest private employer in the nation, Walmart’s labor practices impoverish some of its own shoppers—and in turn impact their food choices.
    — Annie Levin, Washington Post, 10 Feb. 2026
  • In desperately poor Afghanistan, the ban seems certain to further impoverish its poorest citizens at a time when the country is in an economic free fall.
    — Los Angeles Times, 4 Apr. 2022
  • Many men were routinely spending a good portion of that money on alcohol, further impoverishing their families.
    — Kai Schultz, New York Times, 24 Feb. 2018
  • By the end of the play, the near-homeless Cyrano is impoverished of resources as well as love and that rarely rings true with some Kevin Kline-type swishing and swashing in the role.
    — Chris Jones, chicagotribune.com, 7 Nov. 2019

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'impoverish.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Last Updated: