BY POLLY MANN
Minnesota without poverty
Nancy Maeker is an activist who really is active in proclaiming her message. She’s the former director of an organization called “Minnesota Without Poverty” and I became one of her followers after hearing her speak at a meeting of “Every Church A Peace Church.” I was disappointed at the small number of people in attendance but promised myself to organize an event at which she would speak. I thought there was little I could learn about poverty, but I soon discovered I actually knew very little.
Research shows that poor health and violence are more common in unequal societies and this inequality is responsible. We in the audience were asked to examine our own history in terms of wealth, education and privilege. Most of us who are white have many advantages over people of color. Becoming aware of and sensitized to this situation, we can work to change “the system.” Those of us in the peace movement are well aware of this need for change but this aspect of inequality is seldom stressed.
The gap between the rich and the poor increases daily. The most direct way this could be changed would be through taxation—increasing income taxes on the rich. But Congress itself is composed of representatives and senators, half of whom are millionaires, according to a recent report of the nonprofit Center for Responsive Politics.
Child poverty in the U.S. is among the worst in the developed world, reported UNICEF in 2014. Nearly one-third of U.S. children lived in households with an income 60% below the national median income in 2008. The share of U.S. children living in poverty has actually increased by 2% since 2008. By contrast, only 5.3% of Norwegian children currently live in homes that meet this definition of poverty. The Star Tribune of July 4, 2015, carried the headline “Poverty Nearly Doubles in Metro Suburbs.”
Wealth continues to attract more wealth. A new venture called “Open the Book” announced in 2014 that Fortune 100 companies received $1.2 TRILLION from the government. The most valuable contracts between the government and private firms were for military procurement. $21.8 billion was granted to corporate recipients in the form of direct subsidies.
So, what to do? I propose we initiate a campaign to reduce the military budget 50% and the 50% saved to be allocated to human needs. We could call it something like “From the Big Bucks to the little Buckaroos” or “Kontractors’ Kash to Kids.” Or we could offer a prize for the best name, prize money to come from the $21.8 billion subsidies those contractors received.
A New Year’s Resolve:
Why is it that the United States with its tremendous wealth has the Western world’s highest rate of impoverishment? Author Mark Robert Rank in his 2015 book, “One Nation, Underprivileged—Why American Poverty Affects Us All,” tells what he has found out about the nation with the Western world’s highest rate of impoverishment—your land and my land—the U.S.A.
So why is this? Five different reasons: 1) the lack of adequately paying jobs; 2) the ineffectiveness of America’s social safety net to pull people out of poverty; 3) the inequities in educational qualities; 4) the lack of political power of socially disenfranchised people; and 5) racial residential segregation. The free market structure has no morality and generally those not “keeping up” with the financial world are viewed as undeserving, of questionable morals and fundamentally different. In some U.S. neighborhoods the life expectancy rate is lower than that of Bangladesh.
However, the United States spends more per capita on health care than any other country in the world. In the year 2000, total health expenditures were $1.3 billion or $4,481 per person annually. The cost to society includes not only medical treatment and special education but also higher high-school-drop-out rates associated with crime and low earning ability.
We are increasingly becoming a society of “haves” and “have-nots.” By 2020, the top fifth of American earners will account for more than 60% of all the income earned. The poor have far less access to legislators who might change this proportion. Two hundred fifty members of the U.S. Congress are millionaires, which might not have an effect on their voting records but, in all likelihood, does. 80% of all political contributions come from less than 1% of the population.
So what is to be done? I suggest that we 1) get involved in anti-poverty work; 2) get involved politically in legislation to improve services for the poor; 3) support an increase in the minimum wage; and 4) read Rank’s book. He himself says it best: “We must open our eyes to the falseness of the pervasive political message that claims we have no collective or governmental responsibilities for our fellow citizens. The deeper morality of social justice and human compassion inextricably link us together.”
