Americans need to stop thinking about poverty as an 'us vs. them' problem. Between the ages of 20 and 75, 75% of all Americans will spend at least one year in or near poverty. 📝 Mark R. Rank
the annual economic cost of childhood poverty in the United States. We relied on the latest government data and social science research in making our cost estimates. In particular, we examined the effect that childhood poverty has upon future economic productivity, health care, and criminal justice costs, as well as increased outlays as a result of child homelessness and maltreatment. Adding up these expenses resulted in an eye-opening estimate that childhood poverty was costing the U.S.
Impoverished children grow up possessing fewer skills and are thus less able to contribute to the productivity of the economy. They are also more likely to experience frequent health care problems and to engage in crime. These costs are borne by the children themselves, but ultimately by the wider society, as well. In this sense, the economic costs of poverty becomes an issue of “us,” rather than “them.
Most of us are familiar with the saying, “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.” It turns out that this is particularly true in the case of poverty. It is not a question of paying or not paying. Rather, it is a question of how we pay, which then affects the amount we end up spending. In making an investment up front to alleviate poverty, thewe will be repaid many times over by lowering the enormous costs associated with a host of interrelated problems.
Shifting our understanding of poverty from a perception of “them” to one of “us” can begin to awaken Americans’ understanding of this deeply rooted economic and social problem. If poverty is no longer confined to strangers, we can’t comfortably sit back and believe that we’re unaffected.
Poverty can and must be reduced. But it starts with the simple recognition that each of us are harmed by the high rates of U.S. impoverishment. For, as Benjamin Franklin wisely pointed out at the signing of the Declaration of Independence, “We must, indeed, all hang together or, most assuredly, we shall all hang separately.”
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