We have all heard Trump’s boasts about our booming economy, but Jan Resseger points out those who are left bond as tax cuts fatten the 1%.
She begins:
Donald Trump has been at Davos this week exalting the United States’ soaring economy. While Trump brags about more people working, however, he neglects to mention the ongoing collapse of manufacturing and its replacement—gig and temporary employment—along with the paltry wages of many workers. Last week Paul Krugman more accurately described how many families are faring in greater Cleveland, Ohio, where I live. Krugman writes: “The other day a correspondent asked me a good question: What important issue aren’t we talking about? My answer, after some reflection, is the state of America’s children.”
The problem starts with today’s jobs and today’s low minimum wage, but Krugman explores a range of other ways the fraying social safety fails to support the poorest children: “What’s especially striking is the contrast between the way we treat our children and the way we treat our senior citizens. Social Security isn’t all that generous… but it doesn’t compare too badly with other countries’ retirement systems. Medicare actually spends lavishly compared with single-payer systems elsewhere. So America’s refusal to help children isn’t part of a broad opposition to government programs; we single out children for especially harsh treatment… The answer, I’d suggest, goes beyond the fact that children can’t vote; while seniors can and do. There has also been a poisonous interaction between racial antagonism and bad social analysis.” Krugman describes all the myths about social programs causing “a culture of dependency” among the poor, and he continues: “At this point, however, we know that cultural explanations of social collapse were all wrong. The sociologist William Julius Wilson argued long ago that social dysfunction in big cities was caused, not by culture, but by the disappearance of good jobs. And he has been vindicated by what happened to much of the American heartland, which suffered a… disappearance of good jobs and a similar surge in social dysfunction… Multiple studies have found that safety net programs for children have big long-term consequences. Children who receive adequate nutrition and health care grow up to become healthier, more productive adults.”
Here are just some of the issues that have emerged in recent articles in my clipping file about the plight of America’s children.
At the top of the list is the persistence of family homelessness in America’s cities. At the end of October, New York City’s Advocates for Children reported that for the fourth year in a row: “The data… from the New York State Education Department show that in the 2018-2019 school year, New York City district and charter schools identified 114,085, or one in ten, students as homeless. More than 34,000 students were living in New York City’s shelters, and more than twice that number (73,750) were living ‘doubled-up’ in temporary housing situations with relatives, friends or others.” While the lack of affordable housing is most extreme in NYC, the problem is growing in other gentrifying cities.
Read the rest of the post. It’s excellent, as always with Jan’s thoughtful critiques.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
In the meanwhile, more money is squandered. Sick.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/eric-trumps-trip-to-uruguay-cost-taxpayers-97830-in-hotel-bills/2017/02/03/ababd64e-e95c-11e6-bf6f-301b6b443624_story.html?fbclid=IwAR0TK3H2XIV0QhkwApQ4MWNJ-sbngyp7rBZO5XRsl-2hOhWaZM0fLAr66MM
Eric Trump’s business trip to Uruguay cost taxpayers $97,830 in hotel bills.
“(M)y guess is that even well-informed voters have little sense of the grim exceptionalism of America’s child-oriented policies, which are Dickensian compared with those of every other advanced country.” Paul Krugman
Trump and company are manipulating behind the scenes to ensure that those that are poor and neediest receive the least. The current administration is looking out for the interests of the already wealthy. As for the poor, “let them eat cake.” Our country needs to undergo systemic change, not from a guillotine, but from concerned people that care about democratic principles. People that care about our most vulnerable will show up and vote for change. We cannot afford four more years of Trumplandia.
Arne Duncan used to recite this business slogan: “plus/and”. The idea is education reform efforts didn’t supplant efforts to offer subsidies or policies for low income children, they added to them.
But “plus/and” is just a silly slogan plucked from business. Of course an investment in one area can preclude investment in another- happens all the time.
People make choices and ed reformers chose to put effort into charter and private schools instead of into housing or wages or neighborhoods. That decision has consequences for all the rest.
I think one of the reasons so many wealthy people latched onto “ed reform” was it’s a lot easier to bash public schools than it is to build affordable housing or raise wages. It doesn’t threaten them at all. They’re simply replacing one school with another. There’s no net increase in their contribution.
Duncan is either a fool or a liar. Charters do nothing for public education other than game the system and drain the coffers. They also serve the cheapest and easiest to educate. They drain budgets and disrupt public schools. Charters are imposed inefficiency for no real gain.
Fool and liar are not mutually exclusive.
Arne Duncan is proof!
“Ed Deform” is cheaper than doing anything that will reduce poverty.
Yes, but not in the long run.
In the long run, the oligarchical class will pay dearly for their failure to address poverty, the real issue in American education. Thank you, Diane, for keeping this issue front and center!
Outstanding piece, Ms. Resseger, as usual. Thank you!!!
Reblogged with this note:
As Jan Resseger points out on her blog today, Trump has been at Davos trumpeting Trump. What else does he ever do? And what he has been crowing about is his supposed economic miracle (having had the good fortune to become president during an uptick in the business cycle that started in the last two years of the Obama administration).
What Don the Con, kind of the shill and the sham, doesn’t point out is that in the United States, arguably the wealthiest country in the history of the world, almost a third of our children live below the poverty line and face regular food insecurity, and in New York City, one in ten children have been identified by their schools as homeless.
So much for the miracle. See Jan’s superb article, here: https://janresseger.wordpress.com/2020/01/24/the-state-of-americas-children-and-what-it-means-for-public-education/
Forgive the typos. cxs: Don the Con, KING of the shill; one in ten children HAS.
Kids don’t vote so why do anything for them? The hypocrites who want the fetus to live don’t care a thing about what happens after it is born.
The whole system stinks. There is a belief in this country that poor people are lazy and greedy. How many times have we heard, “Cutting food stamps will make these people get a job and they will feel SO much better about themselves.” OR, “Make people get a job if they want to continue to get healthcare.” The fact is that most people who are healthy and get Medicaid are working.
The wealthy and those who are really comfortable have no idea of what poverty feels like. It isn’t something that is easy to get out of, especially in this country where ‘handouts’ are considered evil or some rotten form of ‘socialism’. It’s okay to give tax cuts to the wealthy because they are the ‘job creators’. No they’re not. They don’t pay decent wages and cut back the number of workers as much as possible. Nobody should have to work 2-3 jobs to survive. These ‘job creators’ willingly take those jobs overseas and pay less.
The deficit is booming and where are the good paying jobs that were supposed to come from the tax cuts? Parents don’t have jobs and the kids suffer. Who can live on $16,600 a year? Ben Carson worked to cut rent subsidies for poor people.
…………
CNN Business
July 10, 2018
The Trump administration is about to start letting states require many Medicaid recipients to work for their benefits.
But millions of Americans in the health care safety net program already have jobs.
Some 60% of working age, non-disabled Medicaid enrollees are working, according to a new report from the Kaiser Family Foundation. That’s about 15 million people.
Plus, nearly eight in 10 recipients live in families with at least one worker.
It’s more common for Medicaid enrollees to hold jobs if they live in states that expanded Medicaid under Obamacare. Some 31 states, plus the District of Columbia, broadened their Medicaid programs to include adults earning up to roughly $16,600 a year.
Boy is this on the nose: “the sociologist William J Wilson argued long ago that social dysfunction in big cities was caused, not by culture, but by the disappearance of good jobs “– which Krugman parallels to the “American heartland” today.
Resseger’s & Krugman’s details on the active defunding of social safety nets for children are chilling. I don’t know if it’s enough to just bring the contrast of better treatment for the elderly vs children to public attention. I agree it’s not just about who gets to vote, but I don’t entirely but Krugman’s racial slant either. This is not a child-centered culture, and never has been– notably, among the WASP culture which still dominates.
“Social Security isn’t all that generous… but it doesn’t compare too badly with other countries’ retirement systems. Medicare actually spends lavishly compared with single-payer systems elsewhere.”
What is the basis of this statement by Krugman?
It doesn’t matter if Medicarte spends lavishly if the costs are multiple times those in other countries.