We know that poverty disproportionately affects women and single moms. In 2013, nearly 16 percent of women and nearly 40 percent of families with children headed by a woman lived in poverty, higher than their male counterparts. We know that women who are poor are more likely to suffer from health…
Archives: Voices
Fact of the Week: Millions of People are Lifted Out of Poverty by Programs Like Social Security, Low-income Tax Credits, and SNAP/Food Stamps
More than 48 million people were poor in the U.S. in 2013. But if Social Security did not exist, more than 75 million people would have been poor. Most of us have elderly parents or other relatives for whom Social Security is an absolutely essential part of their monthly budget….
Head Smacker: Voter ID Laws Further Silence Those Whose Voices Need to Be Heard the Most
“There is only one motivation for imposing burdens on voting that are ostensibly designed to discourage voter-impersonation fraud, if there is not actual danger of such fraud, and that is to discourage voting by persons likely to vote against the party responsible for imposing the burden.” – 7th Circuit Court…
Poverty in the 50 Biggest U.S. Cities
As we noted in our Head Smacker last week, poverty is rampant in cities across America. And poverty among children in cities is even higher. We did a little more digging on this subject and, using recently-released Census Bureau data for 2013, put together a table showing poverty in the…
Head Smacker: U.S. Corporate Profits at All-Time Highs; Taxes at All-Time Lows. But Key Leaders Say We Need to Cut Corporate Taxes
An interesting confluence of findings in the last couple of days. First, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) projected economic growth in the U.S. would exceed other major developed nations next year, predicting, as reported in the New York Times, we would “advance ahead of many large economies, not just in…
Fact of the Week: Those with Less Give More
While millions of Americans struggled through the Great Recession and in the years that followed, the need seen by charities was higher than ever. Many charities experienced a decline in donations during these years. However, those who struggled the most found a way to dig even deeper into their pockets…
You Won’t Believe How Little $8.25 an Hour Buys
This post was originally published on Oxfam America’s First Person blog on Sept. 29. For my hard-working family and friends who earn just above the U.S. minimum wage, a paycheck doesn’t go very far. My daughter struck it lucky when she landed a job for $8.25 an hour at the local…
Head Smacker: Poverty is Rampant in Cities. Where is the Urgent Response?
One in seven Americans is poor. But what if poverty were far more prevalent – say, if one in four were poor. What if the concentration of poverty among children were still higher: at least one in three. At those very high levels, we would expect many things to go wrong. …
What’s the State of Poverty in Your State? – Part 2
Last week, we highlighted some of the fabulous work our state partners did surrounding the reports on poverty in their states that they released in conjunction with CHN . The work continued this week, with even more organizations releasing reports based on the new Census Bureau data, and spreading the word…
Some Say $10.10 Would Hurt Business, But Most Business People Disagree
This post was originally published on Oxfam America’s blog, The Politics of Poverty, on Oct. 2. U.S. businesses are in. The American public is in. So what’s next on the minimum wage, Congress? It has long been the argument from some voices in business—or at least their Washington lobbyists and…
Fact of the Week: Only One in Four
Unemployment Insurance Reaches Historically Low Share of Jobless At the Witness Wednesday events held throughout this summer, in our emails, and here on our blog, we’ve continued to make the case for why Congress should renew unemployment insurance (UI) benefits for the long-term jobless that were allowed to expire last December….
What’s the State of Poverty in Your State?
Last week, CHN released a national report, New Census Data Confirm Millions Are Still Being Left Behind, on the state of poverty in the U.S. This week, we’ve been busy working with partner organizations in nearly 20 states to prepare and release state reports using the data from the American Community…