"This is a book ripped from the headlines, from Black Lives Matter to recently thriving downtowns stripped of office workers and service workers. Those catching the brunt of it all, those with the steepest hills to climb, may have been fucked at birth. But for everyone, as Maharidge observes, the feeling of safety is folly. A sharp wake-up call to heed the new Depression and to recognize the humanity of those hit hardest." -Kirkus Reviews, STARRED REVIEW "Dale Maharidge takes us coast to coast in 2020, down highways along which he first reported decades ago. His honed class awareness-unrivaled among contemporary journalists-reveals that today's confluent health, economic and social crises are the logical conclusion to generations of unvalidated, untreated despair in a wealthy nation. Forget hollow commentary from detached television news studios in New York City. Fucked at Birth is the truth." -Sarah Smarsh, Heartland: A Memoir of Working Hard and Being Broke in the Richest Country on Earth Pulitzer prize-winning journalist Dale Maharidge has spent his career documenting the downward spiral of the American working class. Poverty is both reality and destiny for increasing numbers of people in the 2020s and, as Maharidge discovers spray-painted inside an abandoned gas station in the California desert, it is a fate often handed down from birth. Motivated by this haunting phrase-"Fucked at Birth"-Maharidge explores the realities of being poor in America in the coming decade, as pandemic, economic crisis and social revolution up-end the country. Part raw memoir, part dogged, investigative journalism, Fucked At Birth channels the history of poverty in America to help inform the voices Maharidge encounters daily. In an unprecedented time of social activism amid economic crisis, when voices everywhere are rising up for change, Maharidge's journey channels the spirits of George Orwell and James Agee, raising questions about class, privilege, and the very concept of "upward mobility," while serving as a final call to action. From Sacramento to Denver, Youngstown to New York City, Fucked At Birth dares readers to see themselves in those suffering most, and to finally-after decades of refusal-recalibrate what we are going to do about it.

First published in 1854, this comprehensive work charts over three volumes the history of poor relief in England from the Saxon period through to the establishment of the Poor Law Amendment Act in 1834 and its reception. This edition, updated in 1898, also includes a biography of the author, Sir George Nicholls. Volume I examines poor relief from the Saxon period to the reign of Queen Anne. This set of books will be of interest to those studying the history of the British welfare state and social policy.

First published in 1854, this comprehensive work charts over three volumes the history of poor relief in England from the Saxon period through to the establishment of the Poor Law Amendment Act in 1834 and its reception. This edition, updated in 1898, also includes a biography of the author, Sir George Nicholls. Volume I examines poor relief from the accession of George I to 1854. This set of books will be of interest to those studying the history of the British welfare state and social policy.

First published in 1854, this comprehensive work charts over three volumes the history of poor relief in England from the Saxon period through to the establishment of the Poor Law Amendment Act in 1834 and its reception. This edition, updated in 1898, also includes a biography of the author, Sir George Nicholls. Volume III examines poor relief from 1834 to 1898. This set of books will be of interest to those studying the history of the British welfare state and social policy.

This book argues that active citizenship and poverty are inextricably linked. A common sentiment in discussions of poverty and social policy is that decisions made about those living in poverty or near-poverty are illegitimate, inadvisable, and non-responsive to the needs and interests of the poor if the poor themselves are not involved in the decision-making process. Inside this intuitively appealing idea, however, are a range of potential contradictions and conflicts. These conflicts are at the nexus between active citizenship and technical expertise, between promotion of stability in governance and empowerment of people, between empowerment that is genuine and sustainable and empowerment that is artificial, and between a "war on poverty" that is built on the ideas of collaborative governance and one that is built on an assumption of rule of the elite. The poor have long been consigned to a group of "included-out" citizens. They are legally living in a place, but they are not afforded the same courtesies, entrusted with the same responsibilities, or respected in parallel processes as those citizens of greater means and those who behave in manners that are more consistent with "middle class" values. Poor citizens engaged in the "war on poverty" of the 1960s started to emerge and force their agenda through adversarial action and social protest. This book explores the clear linkages between engaged citizenship and poverty in the United States, revealing a war on poverty and impoverished citizenship that continues to develop in the twenty-first century.

Rethinking Black Motherhood and Drug Addictions: Counternarratives of Black Family Resilience offers a unique perspective on the complexities of being a Black mother addicted to crack, powder cocaine, heroin, and crank. Qualitative interviews provide rich narratives from five Black mothers challenging negative controlled images and stereotypes of Black motherhood and drug addiction. Using Black Feminist Thought, Critical Race Feminism, and Resilience as conceptual frameworks, this book confronts hegemonic constructions of Black mothers and their children within the context of drug addictions. Particular attention is focused on using the mothers' self-definitions of struggles and family resilience to dismantle the negative controlled images of the junkie and the crack ho' and her crack baby. The mothers in this book speak truth to their experiences with motherhood and addictions to some of the most powerful street drugs that explicitly defy the junkie, crack ho', and crack baby images. The book also addresses tensions existing within researcher-participant relationships and nuances unique to research with Black mothers in recovery. Personal lessons learned and challenges experienced during the research process are highlighted as Tivis shares dilemmas of self-reflections of positionality, accountability and use of language. Rethinking Black Motherhood and Drug Addictions contains important implications for research and practice in education and across other disciplines concentrating on mothers and children from racially diverse backgrounds. This book will be relevant for both undergraduate and graduate students and academics within these disciplines. Rethinking Black Motherhood and Drug Addictions will be of interest to advanced pre-service teachers and other disciplines engaging in clinical and professional practice with addiction and with families.

First published in 1979, Urban Poverty in Britain 1830-1914 examines the plight of the poor in towns as a direct result of industrialization. This valuable study examines the major causes of poverty - low pay, casual labour, unemployment, sickness, widowhood, large families, old age, drink and personal failings - and society's response to the problem. It also pays attention to the changes in food consumption brought about by migration to the urban areas. Detailed accounts of specific problems and specific situations are combined with a look at the broader questions, and subsequently provides a thorough account of urban poverty in this period.

Across South Asia in the last two decades, there has been widespread emphasis on governance reforms aiming to reduce poverty through Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). The recent development agenda has had great impact over the region , and this book finds that it largely widens the gap between the rich and poor, which combined with rising inflation, contributes to political instability. The book analyses the discourses of development agenda and governance crisis and provides a survey of the region by not only focusing on India, Pakistan and Bangladesh but also on the smaller countries in the region, such as Bhutan. Explaining three components of the development agenda as criteria for economic development - poverty reduction, governance reforms and civil society participation through liberal democracy - this book explores the consequences of the neo-liberal democracy and recent development agenda coupled with governance reforms. This work argues that the political economy of South Asia is largely derived from experiences of historical colonialism and recent changes driven by contemporary rise of India as a global power after the triumph of new-liberal democracy and market capitalism in the post-cold war era. It proposes a strengthening of the instruments of endogenous governance and people's participation in South Asian countries to reduce poverty through MDGs and other development goals in combination with top-down and bottom up approaches. Offering an understanding of governance and development in the context of the South Asia, this book will be of interest to academics in the fields of Political Economics, International Development Studies, Political Science, and Governance Studies, as well as policy makers.

This book brings together a vast range of pre-eminent experts, academics, and practitioners to interrogate the role of media in representing economic inequality. It explores and deconstructs the concept of economic inequality by examining the different dimensions of inequality and how it has evolved historically; how it has been represented and portrayed in the media; and how, in turn, those representations have informed the public's knowledge of and attitudes towards poverty, class and welfare, and political discourse. Taking a multi-disciplinary, comparative, and historical approach, and using a variety of new and original data sets to inform the research, studies herein examine the relationship between media and inequality in UK, Western Europe, and USA. In addition to generating new knowledge and research agendas, the book generates suggestions of ways to improve news coverage on this topic and raise the level of the debate, and will improve understanding about economic inequality, as it has evolved, and as it continues to develop in academic, political and media discourses. This book will be of interest to academics and practitioners alike in the areas of journalism, media studies, economics, and the social sciences, as well as political commentators and those interested more broadly in social policy.

From the Man Booker shortlisted author of Harvest.

Alfred Busi, famed in his town for his music and songs, is mourning the recent death of his wife and quietly living out his days in the large villa he has always called home. Then one night Busi is attacked by a creature he disturbs as it raids the contents of his larder. Busi is convinced that what assaulted him was no animal, but a child, ‘innocent and wild’, and his words fan the flames of old rumour – of an ancient race of people living in the bosk surrounding the town – and new controversy: the town’s paupers, the feral wastrels at its edges, must be dealt with. Once and for all.

Lyrical and warm, intimate and epic, The Melody by Jim Crace tracks the few days that will see Busi and the town he loves altered irrevocably. This is a story about grief and ageing, about reputation and the loss of it, about love and music and the peculiar way myth seeps into real life. And it is a political novel too – a rallying cry to protect those we persecute.

This book studies the transformation of work in couples in Germany, the Netherlands, the Flemish part of Belgium, Italy, Spain, Great Britain, the United States, Sweden, Denmark, Poland, Hungary, and China. It provides evidence that gender role change in couples has been slow and asymmetric, and demonstrates the importance of institutional differences among modern societies, determining the timing, speed, and pattern of the transition from male breadwinner to the dual-earner family mode.

Poor people in developing countries are often affected by droughts, floods, illness, crop failure, job loss, and economic downturns. Much of their energy goes into coping with these shocks and into day-to-day survival. While insurance and credit markets, combined with widespread social security, provide an important cushion against poverty in rich countries, the need for immediate survival may lock the poor into persistent poverty in developing countries. The poor in developing countries do have informal mechanisms to cope with risk and misfortune. These are based on income diversification, risk avoidance, self-insurance by saving together with family, and community-based mutual assistance. Nevertheless, the scope of these mechanisms remains limited. Repeated individual-specific shocks such as illness or pests, or covariate risks associated with drought, flood, or recession, undermine the ability of individuals and their families to cope with risk. We now know much more about vulnerability to risk and how poor people cope. Even more importantly, we have learned much about the large long-term consequences of these risks, which condemns many to persistent poverty and excludes them from economic growth. But there is much that can be done. The micro-level studies that underpin this book offer new insights on how effective public action could be more effective in protecting the vulnerable against persistent poverty. Policy should focus on providing a comprehensive menu of ex-ante and post-crisis protection mechanisms, including new forms of insurance, savings, safety nets, and the means to strengthen the poor's asset base. Local communities have a big role to play: public funds should not be used to replace indigenous community-based support networks; rather they should be used to build on the strengths of these networks to ensure broader and more effective protection. With numerous thematic chapters and case studies of both best practice and of failure, from a mix of low-income and middle-income countries across the developing world, this book evaluates alternatives in widening insurance and protection provision, and makes an important contribution to the topical field of insurance and risk.

First published in 1972, Victorian Aspirations is the story of the personal struggles and achievements of Charles and Mary Booth, as remembered by their families and as revealed in private family papers, especially in their letters to each other. Charles Booth started his investigations into the social conditions of the English lower classes at the critical moment in the history of social reform. From this work, he produced Life and Labour of the People in London, a comprehensive and instructive account of the condition of the London poor. All seventeen volumes were carefully revised and corrected by his wife Mary. This book reveals a detailed and fascinating picture of the way of life of the late Victorian intelligentsia and provides interesting glimpses of many well-known figures of English public life who were relatives and friends of the Booths, such as Macaulay and the Webbs. It will be of particular interest to students of Victorian social history.

Poor News examines the way discourses of poverty are articulated in the news media by incorporating specific narratives and definers that bring about certain ideological worldviews. This happens, the authors claim, because journalists and news editors make use of a set of information strategies while accessing certain sources within specific social and political dynamics. The book looks at the case of the news media in Britain since the industrial revolution and produces a historical account of how these media discourses came into play. The main thesis is that there have been different historical cycles that reflect particular hegemonic ideas of each period. Consequently, the role of mainstream journalism has been a subservient one for existing elites when it comes to the propagation of dominant ideas.

The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) have contributed to reductions in poverty and improvements in the human condition in many parts of the world since their "invention" in 2000 and 2001. It nonetheless remains the case that today, as on all the previous days of the twenty-first century, almost one billion people will go hungry. Debates about whether the MDGs have made a positive contribution to poverty eradication and/or whether they have achieved as much as they should have done are becoming more frequent as 2015 and the "end of the MDGs" approaches. This book highlights that active debate about what the MDGs have achieved and what that means for the crafting of a post-2015 international framework for action, must become a priority. The work begins by examining the global context of the goals from a variety of perspectives, and moves on to focus on the region that continues to be the most impoverished and which looks likely to fall short of meeting many of the MDGs: Africa. Presenting both a broad overview of the issues and drawing together prestigious scholars and practitioners from a variety of fields, this work provides a significant contribution to debates surrounding both global poverty and the success and future of the MDGs.

By focusing on Mamluk Cairo, Adam Sabra explores the attitude of medieval Muslims to poverty and the experience of being poor in an Islamic society. He also considers the role of pious endowments (waqfs) in sustaining the poor. In this way the book affords fascinating insights into a world far removed from elite society, hitherto the focus of Mamluk studies. This trend, in conjunction with comparisons offered between the Islamic world, Europe and China, will entice a broad range of scholars from within the field and beyond.

The India Migration Report 2017 examines forced migration caused by political conflicts, climate change, disasters (natural and man-made) and development projects. India accounts for large numbers of internally displaced people in the world. Apart from conflicts and disasters, over the years development projects (including urban redevelopment and beautification), often justified as serving the interests of the people and for public good, have caused massive displacements in different parts of the country, disrupting the lives and livelihoods of millions of people. The interdisciplinary essays presented here combine a rich mix of research methods and include in-depth case studies on aspects of development-induced displacement affecting diverse groups such as peasants, religious and ethnic minorities, the poor in urban and rural areas, and women, leading to their exclusion and marginalization. The struggles and protests movements of the displaced groups across regions and their outcomes are also assessed. This volume will be of great interest to scholars and researchers of development studies, economics, sociology and social anthropology and migration studies.

More than three billion people, nearly half of humankind, live on less than two-and-a-half U.S. dollars per person per day. Studies have shown repeatedly that the main and often the sole asset of the poor is their labor. It follows that to understand global poverty one must understand labor markets and labor earnings in the developing world. Excellent books exist on ending world poverty that discuss in depth many important aspects of economic development but do not focus on employment and self-employment, work and non-work. Working Hard, Working Poor fills in where the other books leave off. Issues of analyzing poverty and low earnings in the developing world are quite different from those in the developed world. The discourse in the developed world is about incentive effects of social welfare programs, cultures of poverty, single-parenthood, homelessness, drug and alcohol abuse, ill health, mental illness, domestic violence, and the like. But in the developing world, different issues predominate, such as own-account work and household enterprises, agricultural work, casual employment, and informal work. And some of the policy issues-stimulating economic growth, harnessing the energies of the private sector, increasing paid employment, and raising the returns to self-employment-take a different twist. This book shows how people in poverty work, what has been effective in helping the poor earn their way out of poverty, and how readers might help.

The politics of austerity has seen governments across Europe cut back on welfare provision. As the State retreats, this edited collection explores secular and faith-based grassroots social action in Germany and the United Kingdom that has evolved in response to changing economic policy and expanding needs, from basic items such as food to more complex means to move out of poverty. Bringing together scholars from different disciplines and practitioners in several areas of social intervention, the book explores how the conceptualization and constitutive practices of citizenship and community are changing because of the retreat of the State and the challenge of meeting social and material needs, creating new opportunities for local activism. The book provides new ways of thinking about social and political belonging and about the relations between individual, collective, and State responsibility.

This collection of essays focuses attention on the global impact of legal policies on levels of poverty. They illustrate the distinct dimensions of poverty in a range of different political and cultural settings and also show how poverty is exacerbated by quite discrete local cultural factors in some instances. There is,nonetheless a universal element which runs through all the contributions. The fate of those who are disadvantaged in society depends crucially on their access to goods through the world of work. Thus gender, ethnic background or disability can result in individuals having a much higher chance of experiencing poverty than those outwith these groups and the success of these groups in achieving a measure of prosperity is bound up with a multiplicity of geographical and political factors. This book is part of the Onati International Series in Law and Society.

The Gospel Coalition Book Award What does the good news of Jesus mean for economics? Too often, Christian teaching and ministry have focused only on the gospel's spiritual significance and ignored its physical, real-world ramifications. But loving our neighbor well has direct economic implications, and in our diverse and stratified society we need to grapple with them now more than ever. In The Economics of Neighborly Love pastor Tom Nelson sets out to address this problem. Marrying biblical study, economic theory, and practical advice, he presents a vision for church ministry that works toward the flourishing of the local community, beginning with its poorest and most marginalized members. Nelson resists oversimplification and pushes us toward more complex and nuanced understandings of wealth and poverty. If we confess the gospel of Jesus, he insists, we must contend anew with its implications for the well-being of our local communities. Together we can grow in both compassion and capacity.

When discussing health, we talk about ailments and afflictions, the potential of modern medicine and the behaviours that affect our health. Yet although these relationships exist, they undermine a more socio-economic understanding of health. This timely book takes a critical perspective to argue that urban poverty and health inequalities are intimately interconnected, and that the increasing disparity between rich and poor will necessarily exacerbate health issues within urban communities. Urban Poverty and Health Inequalities documents how life has become increasingly insecure and stressful for growing numbers of people due to increased insecurities in employment, income and housing, rising living costs, and the retrenchment of welfare and social services. The book explores the role of history and media depictions of poverty and health inequalities in influencing the current situation. A central objective is to advance ways to understand and respond to urban poverty as a key social determinant of health. The authors pay particular attention to the ways in which punitive responses to urban poverty are further exacerbating the hardships faced by people living in urban poverty. Looking at issues of class, age, gender, ethnic and disability-based inequalities, the book offers both critical theory and grounded solutions to enable those living in poverty to live healthier lives. The collateral damage resulting from current socio-economic arrangements reflects political choices regarding the distribution of resources in societies that needs to be challenged and changed. The authors attend to initiatives for change, offering practical responses to address urban poverty, including efforts to address wealth distribution, the potential of living wage and Universal Basic Income initiatives, social housing and anti-oppressive welfare systems.

In Engaging Schooling, the authors use case studies to engagingly demonstrate how schools can use pedagogical change to enable students from low SES backgrounds to benefit academically and socially from their schooling. The book, which builds on Exemplary Teachers of Students in Poverty from the same research team, deals with key issues around the reshaping of schooling and teaching, focusing on structures for mentoring and research practice among teachers. It significantly advances international literature that highlights the role of pedagogy for engagement in the educational success of students from low SES backgrounds. Moving beyond the individual classroom to focus on whole-school change, the book provides a clearer picture of processes which schools might undergo to engage students in low SES contexts, including teacher research, mentoring practices, instructional leadership and classroom discourses. The book will be of interest to all students, teachers and professional researchers in the field of teacher education.

Hurricane Katrina inflicted damage on a scale unprecedented in American history, nearly destroying a major city and killing thousands of its citizens. With far too little help from indifferent, incompetent government agencies, the poor bore the brunt of the disaster. The residents of traditionally impoverished and minority communities suffered incalculable losses and endured unimaginable conditions. And the few facilities that did exist to help victims quickly became miserable, dangerous places. Now, the victims of Hurricane Katrina find themselves spread across the United States, far from the homes they left and faced with the prospect of starting anew. Families are struggling to secure jobs, homes, schools, and a sense of place in unfamiliar surroundings. Meanwhile, the rebuilding of their former home remains frustrating out of their hands. This bracing read brings readers to the heart of the disaster and its aftermath as those who survived it speak with candor and eloquence of their lives then and now.

In The Space of Boredom Bruce O'Neill explores how people cast aside by globalism deal with an intractable symptom of downward mobility: an unshakeable and immense boredom. Focusing on Bucharest, Romania, where the 2008 financial crisis compounded the failures of the postsocialist state to deliver on the promises of liberalism, O'Neill shows how the city's homeless are unable to fully participate in a society that is increasingly organized around practices of consumption. Without a job to work, a home to make, or money to spend, the homeless-who include pensioners abandoned by their families and the state-struggle daily with the slow deterioration of their lives. O'Neill moves between homeless shelters and squatter camps, black labor markets and transit stations, detailing the lives of men and women who manage boredom by seeking stimulation, from conversation and coffee to sex in public restrooms or going to the mall or IKEA. Showing how boredom correlates with the downward mobility of Bucharest's homeless, O'Neill theorizes boredom as an enduring affect of globalization in order to provide a foundation from which to rethink the politics of alienation and displacement.