US child poverty on the rise—statistics mask depth of crisis

Child Poverty in Rich Countries, 2005, a report by the UNICEF Innocenti Research Centre, provides a comparative assessment of the conditions facing poor children in industrialized nations, primarily in Europe but also including the US.

The study begins with this assertion: “Protecting children from the sharpest edges of poverty during their years of growth and formation is both the mark of a civilized society and a means of addressing some of the evident problems that affect the quality of life in the economically developed nations.” By this standard, the US has the dishonor of being one of the most uncivilized of the major industrialized countries.

While Denmark and Finland led the 26 participating OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) countries with child poverty rates below 3 percent last year, Mexico and the United States were at the other end of the spectrum, both with child poverty rates of more than 20 percent. The current rate for the US, 21.9 percent, is greater than the still comparatively high figure of 17 percent reported by the US Federal Interagency Forum on Child and Family Statistics. The discrepancy is due to qualitative differences in definitions and measures of poverty.

The UNICEF report notes that the US, in compiling federal data on the poor, has generally favored an “absolute” poverty line defined as a level of consumption, “the ability to purchase a defined quantity of goods and services.” Most other OECD members, on the other hand, generally draw poverty lines based upon median national incomes, or the relative wealth and lifestyles of their communities. A child is considered poor by this measure if the income available to that child is less than half of the median income available to a child in a given country. It is the preferred definition of poverty by public aid programs and the measure used by UNICEF.

By the absolute measurement, child poverty in the US is lower today than a decade ago. However, from 2001 to 2002, a significant rise occurred that placed nearly half a million more children in poverty. From 2002 to 2003, the rate increased again, from 16.7 to 17.6 percent, even during what has been characterized as a period of economic recovery following recession. More significantly, children living in extreme poverty, or less than half of the poverty line, grew by 11.5 percent in 2002, signaling the collapse of social protective measures for the nation’s poorest citizens. Federal statistics indicate that the percentage of children in poverty is still lower overall than the peak of 22 percent in 1993, when nearly 8.4 million families lived below the poverty line.

In 1996, in a display of bipartisan cruelty, the federal government enacted the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act as a radical welfare “reform.” The Clinton administration began dismantling welfare via the abolition of the federal entitlement program, Aid to Families with Dependent Children. In its place, the state-based Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program was established. Millions of welfare recipients were forced off of benefits and into low-wage employment with no health benefits. Welfare rolls were cut in half, and by the end of Clinton’s second term, children who remained dependent on the government for support saw an average drop of more than 6 percent in the real value of aid they received, according to UNICEF. As of 2000, the value of governmental support was $200 less each year than the average assistance that was provided in 1991 to a low-income family.

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http://wsws.org/articles/2005/jun2005/pove-j01.shtml