A little on..."The Poverty Line"

So I was listening to the radio today and they said that 1 in 6 children live below the poverty line. I was curious what the "poverty line" was exactly for our family of 6. Turns out it is $28,400! I'm proud to announce that for the first time in our married life our children are finally above the poverty line and all their pain and suffering can end.

In the public announcement on the radio it said that "this means children going without food, clothing, and medicine".

In many cases, children don't need to go without...it's the parents that need to go without (cable, high-speed internet, nice clothes, cars, eating out, etc...)

Our children rarely ate all the food we offered them, always had more than enough clothes (although Ruth may not agree with me on that one), and had heath care at all times ranging from $200-725 a month depending on the provider and year.

One thing I'd like to say is that income level is probably only a small indicator of "poverty" in the United States. We had a small income in school, but we also had a great network of support: supportive and financially stable family, helpful friends, and uplifting companions and acquaintances from church.

Another important thing we had was education. Now I'm not talking about our bachelor degrees, but a basic understanding of financial management, that is: spend less than you make.

All these things were so helpful we were able to live a comfortable and satisfied lifestyle on ~$23,000 a year without help of government programs like Medicaid and food-stamps. We did agree to accept a large tax credit each year, although it never was enough to put us above the "poverty line".

Unfortunately we have decided to help those who are below the "poverty line" by defining poverty as a lack of money and thus "fixing" the problem by given them money. I regret that for now I'll have to be one of those annoying people that points out a problem with out providing the solution. We have picked the easy fix which doesn't always work too well. The proper fix is much more complicated. It involves people helping people because they care, not government taxing people above the "poverty line" and "helping" those below it in a systematic, impersonal way.

Blah, blah, blah...now I'm rambling

Here's the link. Is your "poor" family below the poverty line like we were?

http://travel.state.gov/visa/immigrants/info/info_1327.html

"Copy and Paste" of today's journal entry:

Yesterday I took Clark to my Grant Hall office to check his eyes for school. They had sent a form home to take to your eye doctor and have filled out. Anyway, it was fun to put my name as the parent and the doctor. He had fun doing all the different tests and looking at all my different instruments. He said, "Wow Dad! Your work is awesome!!!" I was very glad that he felt that way.

Last night Ruth and I watched "Shadow of the Thin Man". It was pretty good. We watched "The Thin Man" about a month or so ago. I guess there's a whole bunch of them. We'll have to watch the rest of them. I think the library has at least 4.

Church went pretty well today. Shanna was a handful during Sacrament meeting, but I think the boys are doing better. I suppose there's always room for improvement in regards to reverence.

Ruth made potato soup and French bread for us tonight. She made double and took some over to a family whose mom just had surgery.

Still no van. It's been in the shop twice as long as expected. Hopefully it doesn't cost twice as much. The family we've been borrowing a minivan from will be returning home from out of town tomorrow night and will obviously need it back. Hopefully we don't have to go too long without one.

I broke my nice rimless glasses:

The alternative makes me a little sad...

For all you Mothers!

Clark was watching a movie and in this particular movie there were some "bad guys" that happened to be women.

Clark asked, "Are those the good guys?" "No" I replied, "they're the bad guys." "No" contended Clark, "girls are good, they can't be bad guys!"