Some of you might remember that for my sociology class, I had to do an ASL project which means that I had to volunteer at various service sites. I wrote about one of the services that I did at a school that had a lot of students with financial disabilities. I loved the experience, but it got me to think about what was going on in their lives, so I decided to do some research on poverty and how it affects kids and I came up with this. The first section involves the stuff that I researched.

STATISTICS

Throughout history, there has pretty much always been poverty. Across the country there are millions of American who fall under the poverty line, and a god portion of those citizens are children and young adults. When children live in a family that is subject to poverty, they generally do not receive the standard care, services, and products that are required to essentially teach them necessary skills. This lack of resources may have multiple negative effects on ones skills as they grow and perhaps as an adult as well. Some of these skills that may be negatively affected include educational skills, physical and mental health, behavior, and others. It has been said that those risks are going to be much higher for younger children than for a teen because they may have a tougher time being able to adjust to the settings and the effects may become more drastic and may lead to serious circumstances. 

Earlier in 2014, Medicaid has released a statement that shows what the National Poverty threshold is depending on the family size. The department states that for a single individual, the national poverty line stands at 11670 dollars. Families that have averaged 4 members faced thresholds of approximately 23850 dollars. This also suggests that the monthly poverty rate is 972.50 for individuals and 1987.50 for families of four.

At the moment, the Federal minimum wage still stands at 7.25 dollars. Because of this, a minimum wage worker who works full time seven days, 42 hours a week may only pull in 1200 dollars per month before taxes. However, this is almost never the case, minimum wage workers rarely work full time. In March 2014, the Bureau of Labor Statistics had found that 64 percent of all American Minimum wage workers work less than 35 hours per week, which means that before taxes, these workers make no more than 1015 dollars per month, or 12180 dollars per year, and again, not all of these part time workers work the full 35 hours per week.

To make matters worse, due to rises in consumer prices, and the lack of a national wage increase, the poverty line has been rising each year. Because of this, more and more of these minimum wage workers and unemployed citizens are being put at risk of poverty. Each of the last few years, Medicaid, among other groups, released a list and the threshold had been slightly changing each year. In 2013, their statement listed the 2013 federal poverty line at 11,490.00 dollars per year for an individual, and the line was approximately 10,890 dollars from 2011 until 2012.

According to various sources, a very large number of children live in a family that is victim to poverty. One such source, the National Center for Children in Poverty has stated earlier in the year that 45 percent of all children in America come from families that are considered to be low income. According to the center, a Low Income family is one that lives at just about twice as much as the poverty level. Because of this, when using the previous statistics of 23850 dollars being the poverty line for a family of four, a low income family of four will be one that pulls together 47700 dollars per year or less.

In addition to 45 percent of all children living in low income families, 22 percent of all children come from families that reside below the poverty line. If this truly is the case, then there are well beyond ten million children across the country that live in poverty. Some of the reasons that poverty has been increasing is due to the lack of necessary wages for working parents and high unemployment rates.

 The center had found that there are more and more children who are facing poverty each year. In 2006, the percentage of children who lived in low income families was 40. This is already a high number, however up until today, the number had kept rising. The rate had increased by five percent during the last seven or so years and this equates to approximately one million additional children who now fall below the low income level.

One very interesting fact which was brought up by the center shows that there is a slight change in the percentages based on the children’s age and that the younger the child is, the higher the percentage of that age group live in low income families. For instance, 49 percent of children up until age three live in poverty while 41 percent of children aged 12 through 17 live in low income families. I see two possible reasons for this; the first one is the higher expenses of raising a baby, which some say could reach as high as 10000 dollars during the first year. Even if the family is just above the low income line, or maybe even significantly above it, this expense can set a family back by quite a bit. The second reason could possibly be the age of the parents. Those who have children at a young age, and may even be in school at the time may have a harder time either completing school, finding a job, and maybe even with keeping a job.

As would be expected, the center had found that certain aspects of the parents have contributed to gaining the status as a low income family. 86 percent of all children who have parents who have not completed high school fall below the low income line while 31 percent of children who have a parent who has college education falls below this line. This does not include just parents who have a degree, just those who have at least completed some amount of college. Further research into these statistics may show a large gap between the two.

89 percent of children who have unemployed parents fall below the low income line, while 30 percent of all children with at least one full time working parent falls below this line. The statistics pulled together by the center show even more in depth findings, such as that the percentage of low income children is more than twice as high for those who live with just a single parent, 70 percent versus 32 percent. And that the most heavily affected region is the south, where 48 percent of all children live below the line.

 

EFFECTS

As stated earlier, it is very possible for children and youth who live in poverty to fall victim to multiple negative effects which may include health, education, social, and more. Those who are in poverty at a young age are at a greater risk of these effects because most of these children do not have access to fundamental resources that are required as a way to essentially help them succeed at an early age. First, the main problem could most likely be health. By this, I don’t essentially mean as in health care and doctor visits, however I mean as keeping the child safe and healthy. One example is hunger, parents who do not make as much money as they should would be more likely to not be able to afford enough food to feed the entire family. Because of this, not only will the child not have access to healthy food, in some extreme cases, these children may not have access to food at all.

Other negative health effects of poverty may show as well. According to the American Psychological Association, youth who are in poverty may also not be able to find themselves able to access areas for sports and physical activities which will further damage a child’s chances of leading a healthy childhood and may spill over into their adult life. In addition to these cases, the association also claims that youth who live in poverty may become victims of violence most likely because of living conditions such as neighborhood and social interactions.

Living in poverty may also lead to multiple emotional problems. Some effects may include stress, depression, and aggression and violence. Both the parents and the children may be put under a lot of stress when faced with financial difficulties. The children may be affected in this way because stress that is affecting the parents may cause them to act differently towards their own kids and may cause them to essentially seem more angered and harsh when around their children. As these children grow older, they may eventually face depression because of the lack of certain resources such as education and social interaction.

All of these various aspects go hand in hand because the loss of one skill may lose to the loss of another skill or may lead to the inability to perform correctly in another setting. For instance, there is education, which may cause many problems for a child who faces poverty. At a very young age, poverty may affect children because parents may not have the ability to essentially pay for their education. When facing poverty, it is possible that children may not learn to read until a much later age because parents may not have access to important material such as books. It is also possible that because of working late hours to try to pull enough money, or by either being a single parent or using a day care, that the parent may simply not have enough time to be with the child during the process of learning to read.

Then of course, you have the price of bringing a child to school. In the United States, there are qualifications that allow children to attend pre-school for free. For the most part across the United States, in order for a child to receive free pre-school, one of the qualifications is that their family’s financial standing must be below 175 percent of the Federal Poverty Guidelines. As mentioned earlier, according to this guideline, families who stand at 200 percent or lower are considered to be low income families. Because of this, it is possible for a child to come from a low income family and not receive free pre-school.

Even beyond the young age, effects can still be seen that stem from education. As children enter elementary school, Middle school, and even high school, financial burden may limit the child’s ability to succeed in school. For example, some students may find trouble with accessing school supplies such as textbooks, writing supplies, and even transportation. Others who are already performing poorly in school may have trouble finding the tools to succeed such as tutoring.

These effects go hand in hand, because actions that take place in the school may have effects on other aspects as well. Performing poorly in school or other aspects may lead to negative effects on social interactions and may hurt a student.

 

SOLUTIONS

The number one solution wouldn’t be to combat the effects, but to fight the source and make sure that children do not grow up in a house that is in poverty. The number one way to do this would be to increase the minimum wage. New York has already increased to eight dollars and if a minimum worker works the 35 hours a week, they would now pull together an extra 1260 dollars per year. Sure, it is a very small rise, but it is a start and a step in the right direction. The only other solution that could be used in regards to the economic aspect, would be creating more jobs and having the unemployment rate decrease. Of course, this is for the parents, not the children, but in return, the children may no longer lives in such conditions.

Then of course, there are many programs out there that are used to combat these effects. There are special school programs out there, government funded and not for profit organizations that offer help for children and young adults. As for the effects side, putting in place more programs and making other programs more affordable would be a great start in aiding these children.

The Administration for Children’s Services deals with children of all sorts, but mostly children that come from families that may not have the financial resources to take care of them. ACS runs all sorts of programs that are designed to help youth and families and they aide in all sorts of general areas such as early education such as reading, writing, and speech, behavior, and more. I feel that programs similar to what is done within this organization would be a great start. More programs within the organization, or more organizations that run similar programs would be very helpful.

Other smaller groups can also make a great difference, programs for education, and maybe even economic and job helping programs and workshops can be held pretty much anywhere. A small community group can set up a workshop at a local library for all community citizens to enjoy or can set up special events in a park or elsewhere. As long as somebody is there to offer advice and to teach these kids and even the parents, the amount of people who are facing poverty and their children will drop as more of them will have the required resources to live  with little conflict due to financial problems.




Well, what are your thoughts on the matter??

Random thread about poverty to get Red Jersey points [CHECK].

Just kidding. It's crazy how poverty is usually associated with third world countries, yet it's right in our backyard where people suffer from it. It may never end, but poverty is definitely an issue that needs to be at the very least recognized everywhere. You wouldn't believe how much apathy some people have for the poor.

megamanmaniac : Yup, it's been in my backyard too for about 20 years now. 

That is a ridiculously high number of people in poverty. I knew that the percentage of people in poverty was high, but not that high. I honestly did not realize it was that widespread (well, to a certain extent). Hopefully that minimum wage does increase, but I cannot see that happening in the near future (relative). Unfortunately, it seems like they would have to increase it every year (or couple of years or so) to help curb problems from inflation, and other issues of that nature, which is something that undoubtedly would not happen. It helps though that we have states like Washington that actually bother to raise it, but it does not seem like other states are following suit (or that many). 

zanderlex :

Poverty ain't so bad. 200 years ago everyone was impoverished according to today's standards. Running water? Electricity? Bah! Those aren't real necessities. The only thing I really want to do is make sure that people can eat.

However, when it comes to children, I would spend every dime in every possible budget to make them college-ready by the age of 4. They will be happy, they will be fed, they will have medication, and they will go to school. Lots of school. I'd love a program where we literally pay parents to make sure their kid goes to and stays at school.

"That's ridiculous! You probably live in a mansion and you're heartless towards the impoverished! You propose horrible standards of living!"

Yep. And I live them. My apartment has an extension chord for electricity. It's generally used to keep my cell phone charged and that's about it. I do not own a fridge. I do not own a TV. I do not have internet. I don't even own a lamp. I don't have a working bathroom, so I use public facilities every time. I do have a natural gas, so every morning I make myself a cup of Raman Noodles with water I brought home the night before from my school. I do own a bottle. When I splurge, it's always food and it's always with my girlfriend.

"Ermagosh! What do you do for a living?"

I make $40 a week setting up chairs at my church. That's it. My boss died in the middle of March, and in February I made about $150 a week. He gave me the apartment he owned for free (he owned the buildings). Before February, I lived in my car because I could not afford rent anywhere. I graduate college in May with my Bachelors in Philosophy. Only 8 semesters, but $36,000 in debt (private school). I've already been accepted into masters school, but will hopefully go work for Houston Police Department come June and make a decent living for a year first.

Again, poverty is not so bad. I eat, I have gas money, and I still have money left over.

What's worse about minimum wage, is that you can include tips in it.
A lot of places calculate minimum wage by taking tips into account, meaning of you don't tip they don't hit minimum wage.
It's both outrageous that tipping has become compulsory, and that they are allowed to treat what should be a bonus as part of the minimum wage.
Frankly id make that illegal.

thenumberone :

It often is. As it occurs, laws pop up against it. It's a loophole that scrupulous business owners attempt to jump through for profits. No one tolerates this for long. Occasionally, they don't win the cases against them and are heavily fined and forced to provide back pay.