THE DIAGNOSIS IS POVERTY - Article
A growing model contends that poverty isn’t something to simply “rise above” any more than exposure to lead or asbestos.
$1.6 trillion. It’s a figure so large, it’s hard to wrap your head around. It’s also the amount of money the U.S. spends each year on programs to help the poor.
While a basic eye test might tell you the sum should mean there’s plenty to go around—to make poverty in the U.S. something you merely read about in history books—a deeper look reveals a more sobering reality.
For all of the money the U.S. spends trying to help people in poverty, we don’t spend enough time trying to understand poverty itself.
Poverty has reached epidemic proportions, and the current U.S. system for addressing it is, on the whole, disjointed, unscientific and unsustainable.