According to the Washington Post, data published in 2012 the income disparity for blacks has not improved in the last 50 years and the ones who feel the brunt of the suffering are the children. Black children are more likely to currently be living in poverty than any other groups.
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| Black children are more likely to be living in poverty than anyone else. |
According to the U.S. Census bureau the children of American make up a disproportionate amount of the poor. While 24% of the population are children, 36% of the poor are children. In 2010, 38% of all black children lived in poverty. One New Yorker described the adult view of how poverty feels, "Poverty is like literally being held back from enjoying life, almost to the point of not being able to breathe." It is estimated that 45.8% of black children under 8 years old live in poverty compared to 14% of white children. Not only are so many children feeling hunger as normal every day, but they watch the family in distress, wonder where they will be sleeping when it gets dark and are forced to live this adult life of constant struggle. A 2012 Frontline television special on PBS highlighted the life many children are grateful for, living in the cheapest motels, which is better than being taken away from the caregivers for homelessness. The National Center on Family Homelessness reports that 1 in 45 children experience no place to sleep every year, homeless. This is about 6.1 Million children. That is about 600 times the entire population of the Stevens Point, WI area. For those with the heart here is the link to the documentary: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/poor-kids/ . One source, clutchmagonline, reports that by 2018 the majority of children will be non-white. The future of our country rests in the hands of hungry distressed children. A change is needed before the country realizes what the product of this type of economy has led to, the decision makers, leaders are of tomorrow are counting on our support today. Education of others is a good place to begin.
I knew the rate for children who didn't know where their next meal was coming from, but I didn't know there was such a high population of the children being minorities. That's also a big thing if the majority of children will be non white in just a few short years. This is something that more people need to be aware of and do what they can to help.
ReplyDeleteShirley,
ReplyDeleteNice blog! At the end, you said a change is needed (and who wouldn't agree?) You suggested education, but I think we should take a different approach. In order to fix a problem, we always need to understand the cause. In this case, my best guess is that the reason children are living in poverty is because they're being raised by single parents (typically single mothers). What can we do to stop this? One thing that we could do would be to enforce more effective child support laws, but in all honesty, that would probably not work, because that would just cause more poverty (and most of the time, the father of the child wouldn't be able to afford it". Another approach would be education, and I think an effective approach would be to give birth control education in impoverished areas, because the best way to not be a single parent is to not have kids. Those are just some suggestions off the top of my head.
I enjoyed reading your blog! You did a very good job of stating the stats of the minority children and how it would compare to Stevens Point. This made me realize how many children are actually homeless each year and that breaks my heart! You made a very good point in saying that the future depends on these children. I agree that it is very important to do what we can to help anyone in need not only because they may be our future but because you never know when you or a family member may be in need. I believe that it is important to do whatever we can to help prevent the numbers from increasing!
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with this blog you have posted and the statistics really hit home for me. I work at the Boys and Girls Club at the Junction City Elementary school, and this is one program kind of like education you suggested that will help these kids who are in poverty, start their ways out of it, and continuing their education to stay out of poverty. We try very hard to give those kids extra help and make sure that they know about their resources around them. We also make sure that they do get all their homework done, so that they don't fall behind in school and eventually drop out. I think these little steps that schools can do to help kids get out of poverty or prevent poverty in the future will help if consistent through out their years.But their is only so much some people can do for these kids.
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