Child Poverty in the United Stated Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words - 1

Child Poverty in the United Stated - Essay Example We have read several articles that address the question of child poverty in the United States. In order to begin to try and gain a critical perspective on this big issue, I will be discussing some of the issues these articles failed to address, in what ways the recommendations they make are unrealistic, and what obstacles exist in the implementation of those recommendations. I will also consider opposing points of view by anticipating the most common objections to the solutions these writers propose. As you will see, even after a brief survey of current thinking on such an important matter, it will be obvious that the issue is both complicated and so interwoven with almost every aspect of society, that while the answer is definitely yes, there is much that could be done to alleviate the vicious cycle of child poverty, there are no solutions that could be successfully pursued without a deep and long-lasting commitment from a very large segment of society because the fact of the matter is: Many have benefited from the very policies and decisions that have created this problem. In Jonathan Marshall’s article, â€Å"Child Poverty Is Abundant†, he asserts that â€Å"economists don’t fully understand the causes of the great inequality [of income] in the U.S,† but it seems to me that the long-term effects of economic decisions in the past 50 years can give us a pretty good idea of the causes, such as freezing the federal minimum wage off and on for years at a time or giving corporations tax incentives for adding jobs overseas or just across the border. Apparently the long-term effect of these decisions on the working poor was not the main priority when they were being made. We need to know why other considerations were thought to be more important, because someone benefited from them, and values different than a commitment