How to Combat Child Poverty in the U.S.
Our nation's leaders must do better than simply accept or ignore that 14.7 million, or 20 percent, of our nation's children are living in poverty. The consequences of poverty and depravity to a child's health, their education, safety, nutrition, and overall well-being limits their opportunity and future.
In our great nation, there is simply no excuse for this. The reality is that not one single child in America should go to bed hungry or homeless. And today's poverty isn't something that just afflicts people who live in our inner cities or in poor, rural areas. It's not something that just afflicts people of one color or ethnicity. It's striking families who never imagined that they could find themselves telling their kids that they don't have any food or that the electricity has been shut off.
Although it takes leadership, a commitment, a promise, accountability, and some effort to combat child poverty, the adoption of a Child Poverty Target, as proposed by British Prime Minister Tony Blair in March 1999, has demonstrated that cutting child poverty is both doable and a choice.
As Blair pledged:
Our historic aim will be for ours to be the first generation to end child poverty. It will take a generation. It is a 20-year mission. But I believe that it can be done if we reform the welfare state and build it around the needs of families and children.
Blair's initial promise was followed up with a number of specific policy initiates that,according to Jane Waldfogel in her book entitled Britain's War on Poverty, helped the United Kingdom (UK) cut its absolute poverty rate in half - from 26 percent of children in 1998-1999 to 13 percent in 2007-2008.
in sharp contrast, the U.S. child poverty rate grew over the same time period, reached a 20-year high in 2011, and remains worse than it was 16 years ago.
Recognizing that our nation can and must do better by its children, Reps. Danny Davis (D-IL), Gerald Connolly (D-VA), Barbara Lee (D-CA), and Elijah Cummings (D-MD) have introduced the "Child Poverty Reduction Act of 2015" (H.R. 2408), which would establish a Child Poverty Target in our country - much like the one that has been so successful in Great Britain.
A Model for Success: Britain's Child Poverty Target
When Prime Minister Blair established the Child Poverty Target, there was some How to Combat Child Poverty in the U.S. | Bruce Lesley: