In today's global economic state, many families and children face reduced circumstances. The 2008 economic crisis became a "household crisis" (PDF) when higher costs for basic goods, fewer jobs and reduced wages, diminished assets and reduced access to credit, and reduced access to public goods and services affected families who coped, in part, by eating fewer and less nutritious meals, spending less on education and health care, and pulling children out of school to work or help with younger siblings. These "new poor" join those who were vulnerable prior to the financial shocks and economic downturn.
Today's statistics are astounding:
- Children represent 24 percent of the population, but they comprise 34 percent of all people in poverty.
- One in three poor people in the United States are children—more than 16.4 million children—an increase of 4.5 million children, or 35 percent (PDF), since 2000.
- A child in the United States is born into poverty every two minutes (every 25 minutes if she is a Asian/Pacific Islander and every 49 minutes if she is an American Indian/Alaska Native). That's 2,573 babies each day.
- Forty-five percent of children under 18 years of age live in low-income families, and one in five live in poor families.
