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
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
I really like the point you make here. We actually discussed this topic in my finance class.
The World Bank defines extreme poverty as living on less than US $1 per person per day, and moderate poverty as less than $2 a day, estimating that "in 2001, 1.1 billion people had consumption levels below $1 a day and 2.7 billion lived on less than $2 a day."
Yep, ONE DOLLAR. If you have a family of five and you live on $5.50 a day then you are moderately impoverished. Crazy huh. Our poor people are kings in the eyes of the most people.
I would be surprised if we had more than 50,000 people in this country that are below the World Banks's line. (yea I just picked the number 50,000...)
Ok now I’m rambling. But i think you make a great point about what poverty is precived as
Oh my gosh! I am above the poverty line....by a lot. I had no idea.
I really like what you said about the parents spending, because I see that everyday. I have people within my own family who are "poor" yet go out, spend 150/mo on cable, buy new clothes, etc while we live on a budget and save. I wish that people would really sit down, look at their finances and figure out how much they can live off of w/o assistance.
But alas, why deprive ourselves or luxuries we don't need. ;-)
Post a Comment