With copious statistics, Edelman (president of the Children's
Defense Fund) documents the sudden increase in poverty among
families with children. In 1983, for instance, toward the end of a
serious recession, nearly 5.5 million children were living in
families making less than $3,969 for three people or $5,089 for
four, while 13-million children in all lived in official poverty.
The subsequent recovery did not benefit these children. Edelman
attributes these grim statistics to a multiplicity of factors,
among them a stagnant minimum wage, which today falls 25 percent
short of the poverty line for a family of three; an 8-percent
decrease in aid to the needy since 1981, coupled with a 24-percent
increase in arms expenditures. Furthermore, unemployment for black
urban males has climbed to nearly 40 percent in the 20-24 age
group, while immigrants (frequently undocumented aliens) often get
entry level jobs Today, black men - having little hope they will
ever earn a breadwinning wage - are increasingly unable or
unwilling to marry. One result is that 58-percent rate of black
babies are born to unmarried mothers. All this - and more - puts
children at risk in often unstable, poorly housed, poorly fed,
poorly clothed families. Edelman calls for a pastiche of government
and private efforts to remedy the situation. Although she mentions
that every industrialized Western nation (except the US)
automatically provides government allowances for every child, she
does not go that far. She says we are not tuned to "massive social
upheavals" and prefer "incremental changes built over time." Her
suggested strategy includes an increase in the minimum wage
sufficient to support a family of three; an increase in money and
food stamps to a minimum equal to 75 percent of the poverty level;
elimination of the anti-family proviso in the states that withhold
benefits if an unemployed father lives with his family. Edelman
also calls for "a substantial federal investment. . .to create
jobs" (how, she doesn't say); better education and job-training
programs; a concerted effort to reduce teen-age pregnancies; and
health insurance for the working poor. Unanswered, unfortunately,
is what effect a higher minimum wage might have on US unemployment.
In sum, a graphic and eloquent documentation of how the hopes and
accomplishments of the 60's were undermined by the inflation of the
70's, and today are virtually destroyed as a seemingly indifferent
society tolerates a growing class of permanently impoverished
families. (Kirkus Reviews)
Too many American families-unstable, broken, often poor-are in
serious peril, and both the reality of the situation and the myths
obscuring that reality call for attention and swift action. In this
most incisive analysis of the parlous state of the family today,
Marian Wright Edelman, President of the Children's Defense Fund,
charts what is happening, exposes myths, and sets a bold agenda to
strengthen families and protect children. In brilliant strokes and
with abundant detail, Edelman describes family conditions over a
generation-the rising curve of teenage pregnancy, the overwhelming
joblessness of young blacks, the trend toward single-parent
households, the increase in hungry and neglected children.
Dispelling common assumptions about these bleak phenomena, she
shows that the birth rate for black unmarried women is stabilizing
while that for unmarried whites continues to rise, that Aid to
Dependent Children does not cause teenage pregnancy or births, and
that the child poverty rate has increased two-thirds for whites in
recent years, as opposed to one-sixth for black children. Overall,
whites are losing ground faster than blacks. Speaking for a growing
number of social commentators, she finds the key to explain the
rising proportion of births to single black mothers: a lost
generation of fathers-young black males unable to marry and support
a family, jobless from lack of education and training. What can be
done? Edelman links the family and child poverty crisis to the
fragile and ephemeral commitment of government to assist the needy.
She suggests establishing a partnership between government, the
private sector, and the black community to ensure children food,
clothing, housing, medical care, and education. "Preventive
investment strategies"-providing health, nutrition, and child care,
raising the minimum wage, preventing teenage pregnancies, and
opening up educational and employment opportunities for heads of
families-will benefit us all. A passionate call to act now, to give
real meaning to traditional American instincts for decency, this
book is essential reading for everyone committed to preserving the
nation's future.
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