When I was writing “Reign of Error,” I researched the proportion of children who live in poverty and learned from what seemed to be the best source (UNICEF) that the United States has the highest child poverty rate of any advanced nation. Actually, UNICEF in another report says we have the second highest child poverty, second to Romania. However, I have been to Romania, and it does not belong in the same ranking with the United States, Norway, Finland, Sweden, France, the U.K., and other Western European nations. Unlike them, Romania is and has long been a very, very poor country.
Another survey by the Southern Education Fund recently found that 51% of American children live in “low-income” homes. In 40 of the 50 states, low income students comprised no less than 40 percent of all public schoolchildren. In 21 states, children eligible for free or reduced-price lunches were a majority of the students in 2013.
Recently I have noticed that apologists for America’s yawning income inequality say either that child poverty doesn’t matter (“great” teachers can overcome it) and/or that we don’t really have so many poor children. Some have even said that poverty is just an “excuse for bad teachers.”
Here is an addition to that discussion by Matt Bruenig in Demos. In this post, he ranks the advanced nations and shows that the U.S. does have an exceptional child poverty rate. It shouldn’t be necessary to explain why poverty matters. Children who are poor tend not to get medical care when they need it; tend not to have educated parents; tend to have more school absences, because of illness; tend to experience periods of homelessness. As compared to children who grow up in secure, middle-class homes, children in poverty carry many burdens not of their making. Western Europe tries to reduce poverty and to make health care and child care accessible and free.
Given the well-known correlation between poverty and low test scores, it seems reasonable to believe that the most effective way to improve school performance would be to reduce poverty.
How could we do that? Bob Herbert’s book Losing the Way suggests the answer: rebuild our crumbling infrastructure. This would create millions of jobs and improve the lives of millions of families. Or better yet, read this article in the New York Times about our collapsing bridges, tunnels, dams, and highways.
We spent 2 trillion on the wars in the Middle East in the past decade. How about spending the next 2 trillion to rebuild our country?
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Hey, I always knew we were exceptional at something.
USA! USA!
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Here’s another rebuttal. I like it just because you don’t hear the phrase “holy cow” nearly enough 🙂
“When I passed along Wright’s methodology to Janet Gornick, the current director of LIS and a professor at the City University of New York, she was taken aback at how poor it was.
“Holy cow. This is nonsensical,” she wrote. “How you get absolute poverty rates from these income deciles is beyond me.”
http://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2015/11/11/9707528/finland-poverty-united-states
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And from the much respected professor emeritus, Steve Krashen…
The White House summit backs the wrong horse
Posted: 11 Nov 2015 05:04 PM PST
Stephen Krashen
Comment on: White House Announces $375 Million for High School Redesign (Education Week)
At the time of the White House summit on high schools, it was announced that high school dropout rates had decreased, and that 81% of American students now graduate from high school in four years, an all-time high. Yet summit leaders still think that there are too many who fail to graduate in four years and “a fundamental reworking of secondary school is necessary.”
The last time I looked, the US ranked about 20th in the world in dropout rate, with 19 countries having a lower percentage of dropouts. Some of the countries that did better are very small (Switzerland, Iceland), but more important, all have lower rates of poverty.
Study after study has shown that poverty is the major factor in predicting school achievement. My review of the research (In Krashen, S. 1999. Condemned Without a Trial: Bogus Arguments Against Bilingual Education. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann Publishing Co.) concluded that the major reason students drop out is economic pressure: They had to work to help their families.
Rather than discuss protecting students from the negative impact of poverty or even trying to reduce poverty, conference attendees focused on new technology, pushing untested but drastic and expensive solutions such as competency-based education.
Posted at: http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/high_school_and_beyond/2015/11/white_house_announces_375_million_for_high_school_redesign.html
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Ellen-You’re right about poverty. Rather than addressing the root causes of poverty, our leaders look to the schools to correct society’s ills. I am sure their big solution will be something to further stymie the efforts of public schools or some tech gadget that will cost taxpayers millions and has a shelf life of two years. Krashen always brings so much common sense to the discussion!
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The right wing and neoliberals don’t think America’s poor are poor enough. With rapacious appetites, the plotting to snatch the rewards of workers’ labor continues. It’s a portrait of shame, over 3 decades, that darkens the soul and promise of our country.
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While spending money (note, spending tax revenues while we’re already a bankrupt nation) on infrastructure may be a good idea, how about restructuring and legislating fairer and more just wages and salaries? We believe in the morality and justice of a minimum wage, why not a maximum wage for executives, managers and the upper-echelon? By setting salary caps we’d ensure more profits gets redistributed down to the working class, not staying with the upper 5 %. Real simple solution, but apparently in our “free market” many believe the upper 5% have the right to hoard profits?
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If we’re so bankrupt, how are we affording Iraq, Afghanistan, and every other Muslim country we’re currently occupying, droning, special oping, etc.?
But, yes, we need to restructure the economy so that more of the money flows to the people to begin with rather than trying to “redistribute” the money through taxes after the fact. Robert Reich’s latest book, SAVING CAPITALISM, gives lots of good ways we could do this.
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We can currently spend in excess because we are deferring the debt to our grandchildren, as you know. Just like they raid Social Security for funds to keep other programs running, or else sectors of the gov’t would shut down (ex. Nat’l parks); so too, they are stealing from our grandchildren to fund our “empire-saving” military exploits (funny, how the West stirred up the hornet nest in the Mid-East, and now is having to deal with it….no wonder they’re mad at us, we exploited and oppressed them for years, viewing their oil as ours).
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How would salary caps ensure that profits get redistributed down to the working class?
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Good question. I envision some kind of law that makes corporations structure their salaries and wages in a more just and equitable manner, so that less profit goes to the upper 5% and more gets down to the working 95%. Of course, making laws about wages is blasphemy and anathema to “free market” types that believe one is entitled to make as much as possible, even via oppression of those under them.
If more money reached the working class (more than the crumbs and trinkets that filter down from a “empower suppliers, trickle-down approach”) then the working class would have more money to buy things with, consume more, which would stimulate demand. This increase in demand would be a blessing to suppliers, ex. corporations, because it would stimulate growth and demand.
So, the false idea that we’ve lived with (ie. empower suppliers, the rich, because they will somehow increase the economy????), needs to be replaced with a new robust plan called “fill it up” (not trickle down); that economies grow and flourish with increased demand, which is accomplished by a robust and empowered majority (middle to lower classes), which is catalyzed by getting more money into their hands, via better wages.
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Sounds like a step-salary scale, with a fixed floor in down years and a profit participation in up years. Interesting idea for a simulation. Risky in terms of unanticipated consequences in the real world. Politically insane. “Living wage” laws at least have the advantage of simplicity.
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I am just guessing, but don’t you think that most of the 1% wealth is generated through investment?
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A reduction in executive expense, would free up capital for business expansion, which would spur greater employment. The roadblock is too little money in the hands of the poor and middle class, who spend at levels greater than 90%, creating demand. The business schools and others promote the idea that business growth is a function of tax rates and supply/cost of capital. The truth is that, neither trumps demand.
The answer to why Buffett and Gates can’t get out of 1st and 2nd places, on the richest men lists, while claiming great largesse that will deplete their fortunes in their lifetimes, would be illuminating.
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>Recently I have noticed that apologists for America’s yawning income inequality say either that child poverty doesn’t matter (“great” teachers can overcome it) and/or that we don’t really have so many poor children. Some have even said that poverty is just an “excuse for bad teachers.”<
You have dispelled the ridiculous claim that child poverty is not really that pervasive.
Why can't we dispel the "great teachers can overcome poverty" meme.
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Having worked with extremely poor ELLs for over three and a half decades, I know that poverty does matter. I also know that if a family pulls together, and the school district provides the necessary support and services, it is possible to overcome many of the effects of poverty. Without direct support, if family members get overwhelmed by substance abuse problems or financial mismanagement, it is very difficult for a child to climb out of hole of dysfunction and poverty that engulfs the family.
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I agree, but the top down corporate educatoin reform fraudsters have placed the responsibility of solving poverty on the backs of public school teachers and without cooperation from both the parents/guardians and children who live in poverty, nothing teachers do is going to work.
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The upper class pundits and powers that be, simply cannot fathom the realities of poor urban (and rural) life, they cannot imagine the levels of family dysfunction and depravity that exist, they cannot begin to understand a world that so far removed from their four star martini lunches, luxury cars, and multi-million dollar homes that it might as well be another planet. To appreciate the degree to which generational poverty and all its burdens negatively affect learning and school success, one has to experience it first hand, day to day, year to year. That is something the ruling class would never dream of doing. Its so much easier to blame “bad” teachers and “failing” schools. And its so much easier to test them than to help them.
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The crumbling public sector infrastructure is just another tool being used to fool the people so those bridges, tunnels, damns and highways that belong to everyone will be turned over to the privatization for profit mafia. Cut funding to maintain and replace infrastructure, it falls apart, people die or are injured, the media makes the pubolic sector look bad and incompetent, and then up steps the reformist fraudsters with boasted, empty promises designed to fool enough people to achieve their agenda of profit and power.
For instance, these fraudsters are waging war on the public sector turning public prisons into private, for profit prisons.
These fraudsters are waging war on the public schools to turn public schools into private for profit schools.
These fraudsters are already converting our public military to private military forces. For instance, the Wall Street Journal published a piece August 22, 2009 with this headline: Afghanistan Contractors Outnumber Troops—and just like all the other public sectors that are being privatized, once what was public is in the private sector, they are opaque and do not answer to the same rules and laws that are guided by the U.S. Constitutions and the Bill of Rights that regulate the public sector.
And then there is this report from the INSS:
In Iraq and Afghanistan, the use of contractors has reached a level unprecedented in U.S. military operations. As of March 31, 2010, the United States deployed 175,000 troops and 207,000 contractors in the war zones. Contractors represented 50 percent of the Department of Defense (DOD) workforce in Iraq and 59 percent in Afghanistan.1
These numbers include both armed and unarmed contractors. Thus, for the purposes of this paper, the term contractor includes both armed and unarmed personnel unless otherwise specified. The presence of contractors on the battlefield is obviously not a new phenomenon but has dramatically increased from the ratio of 1 contractor to 55 military personnel in Vietnam to 1:1 in Iraq and 1.43:1 in Afghanistan.
Click to access inss_hammes-private-contractors.pdf
Correct me if I’m wrong, but the war to privatize ever element of the the public sector, destroy private and public sector labor unions and erode the U.S. republic and its democracy started with President Reagan’s administration, who also ended the Fairness Doctrine that required the media to be more transparent, equal and balanced, and honest in its reporting. When the U.S. Congress voted YES to make the Fairness Doctrine the law, Reagan vetoes it and it was vetoed again by a Bush. After that hate radio exploded with no limit to how much this sector the the media lies and manipulates facts and is allowed to get away with it.
Don’t forget, the private sector turned our medical system from non-profit to for-profit under Reagan.
1980s
Corporations begin to integrate the hospital system (previously a decentralized structure), enter many other healthcare-related businesses, and consolidate control. Overall, there is a shift toward privatization and corporatization of healthcare.
1990s
Health care costs rise at double the rate of inflation.
2000s
Health care costs are on the rise again.
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It’s really bad. This shocked even me:
“Most employees assume that states use their state income taxes to improve school systems, pave roads, or hire more police. That is, after all, part of the social contract we have with our government. We pay taxes and get public services.
But more and more of those tax dollars aren’t funding services; they aren’t even getting to the state capital. Sixteen states now allow corporations to withhold state income taxes from employees and keep the money as an incentive to locate to or remain in a state. That means that, in effect, employees pay personal income tax to their company rather than their state government.”
http://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/Opinion/2012/0517/Your-employer-may-be-pocketing-your-state-income-tax
The information isn’t on their pay stub. They believe they are paying for public services when they’re actually paying their employer as a result of a deal their “representatives” cut with the employer.
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Wow, that was scary and startling new info for me. I wonder what states? Are they all in GOP land?
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Lloyd, I remember listening to an NPR radio interview w a gentleman who’d worked for Halliburton in Iraq. He & others were paid $100k as truck drivers to deliver supplies to US troops–who weren’t paid as well. Yes, it was life-threatening work but I thought if we have to pay consultant firms to deliver supplies to our troops–maybe the military shouldn’t be there at all.
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And the troops in the US military who drive those big supply truck do not get paid $100k.
Just looked it up and it is poverty wages for the U.S. military troops.
An E1 no matter how many years he/she has in the military gets paid the same monthly salary even if they’ve been in for 38 years. To be fair, I don’t think the military would keep someone for 38 years who was stuck as a PFC.
It’s $1,547 a month or $18,564 annually. Usually there is more if you are in a combat zone—and work can be 24/7 for days at a time. Even when asleep, our troops are on duty.
http://www.militaryfactory.com/military_pay_scale.asp
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Nope, LLoyd, giving your employer your tax money is an equal opportunity scam: Colorado, Connecticut, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Maine, Mississippi, Missouri, New Jersey, New Mexico, North Carolina, Ohio, South Carolina, and Utah.)
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Do you have a link to a source that lists these states and reveals how this scam came about?
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The founder of military contractor, Blackwater, is brother to Betsy DeVos, promoter of charter schools. The Beltway and state capitols are where 90% of Americans fail to be heard so that the richest 150 families can further redistribute America’s productivity to themselves.
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The best person on this is Larry Summers, because who would ever think HE would come around?
“He also rejected one explanation for rising inequality — that the workforce is inadequately educated — in favor of the more liberal economist’s argument that businesses simply aren’t creating enough jobs and that technology has allowed profits to accumulate in the hands of the top 1 percent. He reiterated that point of view yesterday, as well.
“There’s a view that I think was a plausible view to hold in 1995, which I would call ‘preserve my carried-interest tax break, the market’s great, yes, there are a lot of people left behind, we need to give them better education, I’m really involved in a charter school, it’s all going to be okay,'” Summers said. “That is not a credible response to the challenges of the American economy in 2015.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/09/10/larry-summers-has-become-one-of-organized-labors-biggest-advocates/
It’s just easier to blame inequality on public schools. Easier and much more convenient for both politicians and private sector business leaders. If it’s the fault of public schools then they’re off the hook, particularly if the “answer” is to just pass out funding to contractors.
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Creating jobs is good, but a living wage is even better. Many children in poverty are growing up in single parent homes (as I did). Often the parent is a working mom making a low wage, sometimes working several jobs to make ends meet. I was working at a local food pantry last month when a woman came in wearing her workplace ID from the local public school district. She had her daughter with her. When an educated person employed in the local schools is eligible to receive food from the local food pantry, wages are just way too low.
We have to stop thinking of the poor as “them” and start thinking as “we”. “51% of children live in low-income homes.” This could be any of us.
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Poor mothers and on a rare occasion dads are the unsung heroes of our country. They struggle alone to provide for children after generally dad has left, and they work multiple jobs to put food on the table. Since our country is big on “accountability,” we need stronger legislation to make deadbeat dads pay for their children. We need something more than garnishing IRS refunds.
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Just one of the ;main reasons I have been backing Bernie Sanders. He has fought this kind of thing, plus other important issues, for a very long time. We know where he stands.
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Don’t get me wrong because I like Sanders. I just wish he would join in supporting strong, democratic public education. He is marching with Washington employees whose privatized jobs are now paying them peanuts, and he is vocally opposed to privatized prisons, even sponsoring legislation against them. Does he not see that these are the same forces with the same middle class destroying agenda at work in public education, and that most of it is directed at women? He should take a look at how the privatization of New Orleans decimated the middle class status of thousands of black teachers. If he supports justice and equality, he should oppose the assault on public education.
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Tweet Bernie information he needs.
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“We spent 2 trillion on the wars in the Middle East in the past decade. How about spending the next 2 trillion to rebuild our country?”
I know it’s not proper to answer a question with a question but with a question like that. . .
. . . Diane, when are you moving to Romania???
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We can only hope that if we were to spend $2 trillion to rebuild the US, that we would do a better job than we did with the $2 trillion we spent “rebuilding” the Middle East.
Who would have guessed that the next round of disaster capitalism might play out right here at home with a crisis created by our own neglect. But then, if there is a profit to be made.
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Remember the civil war era and government contracts, the age of shoddy, we might just revisit those days.
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RL, Setting salary caps officially would likely result in lawsuits. Instead a grass roots movement: Call corporate board directors & say you’ll Opt Out of buying products if CEO compensation is way out of line cf the employees’ pay. Many folks have phone plans w unlimited calls (better than e-mails, which can be ignored).
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In a government of the people, by the people and for the people, the people write the laws, via their representatives. The courts interpret the law. The role of judges is to render decisions based on the law, not on their own beliefs. Unfortunately, in practice, the U.S. has strayed far from that compact.
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Reblogged this on David R. Taylor-Thoughts on Education.
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And then there’s brain development and nutrition, right from the womb on.
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Martin Luther Elementary School is a school in Las Vegas, NV. This is a high risk school in an underprivileged area with the vast majority of students below the poverty line. This school’s demographic consists of 65.53% of a Hispanic population, and 18.62% of an African American population with 85.54%, receiving state subsidized breakfasts and lunches. Of the Hispanic population, 36.85% are non native speakers and are English Language Learners.
With The school in an economically depressed zone, there is a need for basic school supplies by these students to help them progress and succeed. My high school is sponsoring MLK Elementary School, and we are trying to raise money to purchase these school supplies for these students as they are expected to run out of supplies by the end of Semester One (January 2016). We are making “Supply Kits” out of monogrammed bags, pencils, notebooks, erasers, markers, etc. It is my goal to harness the generosity of the cloud, and raise the funds needed to ensure a complete school year for these children.
Please help us support our fundraising at https://www.gofundme.com/mlkschool ! Anything really makes a difference.
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Martin Luther Elementary School is a school in Las Vegas, NV. This is a high risk school in an underprivileged area with the vast majority of students below the poverty line. This school’s demographic consists of 65.53% of a Hispanic population, and 18.62% of an African American population with 85.54%, receiving state subsidized breakfasts and lunches. Of the Hispanic population, 36.85% are non native speakers and are English Language Learners.
With The school in an economically depressed zone, there is a need for basic school supplies by these students to help them progress and succeed. My high school is sponsoring MLK Elementary School, and we are trying to raise money to purchase these school supplies for these students as they are expected to run out of supplies by the end of Semester One (January 2016). We are making “Supply Kits” out of monogrammed bags, pencils, notebooks, erasers, markers, etc. It is my goal to harness the generosity of the cloud, and raise the funds needed to ensure a complete school year for these children.
Please help us support our fundraising at https://www.gofundme.com/mlkschool. Though we all look at these issues objectively in articles and statistics, here is where we can see something being done about these issues first hand.
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Bernie Sanders adds to the impact of child poverty on school performance… while media blames teachers it is this poverty which is directly tied to failure in school.
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