Families fail to get out of the doldrums since recession began in 2008.
By Raif Karerat
WASHINGTON, DC: A rising number of U.S. children are living amidst poverty and stark racial inequities in the wake of the ongoing Great Recession that began in 2008, according to a new report published by the Annie E. Casey Foundation.
Twenty-two percent of American children were living in poverty in 2013 compared with 18 percent in 2008, according to the latest Kids Count Data Book, with problems most severe in South and Southwest. In 2013, the U.S. Department of Human and Health Service’s official poverty line was $23,624 for a family with two adults and two children.
African American children were twice as likely to live in high-poverty areas and to live in single-parent homes compared to white children. In all, 39 percent of African American children lived in poverty in 2013, compared to 33 percent of Hispanic kids, 14 percent of white children, and a 22 percent national average.
“The fact that it’s happening is disturbing on lots of levels,” said Laura Speer, the associate director for policy reform and advocacy at the Casey Foundation, a non-profit based in Baltimore, Md. “Those kids often don’t have the access to the things they need to thrive.”
The foundation says its mission is to help low-income children in the U.S. by providing grants and advocating for policies that promote economic opportunity, according to USA Today.
“Even though the recovery has generated a lot of jobs and we’re seeing the stock market do well,” the foundation’s president, Patrick McCarthy, told The Guardian, “the rising tide of the recovery has not lifted all boats equally.”
“You’ve got not just decades but literally hundreds of years of discrimination, lack of opportunity and challenges for African American, Latino, American Indian families,” he continued, adding that the obstacles of discrimination compounded with broader trends, creating cycles of poverty that could last generations.
Although not ranked with the 50 states, Washington DC and Puerto Rico “experienced some of the worst outcomes” compared to the other parts of the U.S., the authors wrote.
Positive signs include fewer uninsured children overall and the all-time high in national high school graduation rates, although McCarthy cautioned that many students are still not sufficiently proficient in math and reading.
He said the foundation calls for a “two-generation approach” that invests in parents and children, including support systems like tax credits, job training and food stamps, as well as much greater investment in early education, according to The Guardian. He also said that businesses could do more, including schedule employees with flexible work hours.