Investing In What Works for America's Communities » Fighting Poverty through Community Development. The Great Recession forced families and communities to confront the worst economic collapse most of us had seen in our lifetimes. When President Obama took office, the economy was shedding 7. Since then, the economy has added over 4. As a result of the economic divergence since 1. The effects of the crisis were most severe for low- income Americans: 2. United States are poor, and more than 1. Poverty and social isolation not only make it hard for these individuals to succeed, but also affect the welfare of our country, and our economy, as a whole. Recognizing these challenges, the Obama administration has adopted a multifaceted approach to reducing poverty and promoting opportunity in order to ensure that all Americans have the ability to reach their full potential. In addition to implementing broad efforts to improve job growth, this approach has focused on reducing immediate hardship owing to the recession while at the same time putting in place longer- term strategies to reduce poverty and put the American Dream in reach for all Americans. THE IMPACT OF THE GREAT RECESSIONThe Great Recession caused many middle- class families to confront unemployment and economic hardship, and even fall into poverty. Millions more families were struggling long before the recession began, and found themselves falling further after the recession took hold. The effects of the recession drove the typical (or median) household income to its lowest level since 1. Americans living in poverty, which for a three- person family means earning less than $1. Over 5. 0 million more Americans are on the edge of poverty. The poverty rate is highest among children, with nearly 1. More than 3. 0 percent of minority children today live in poverty. And almost half of American children who are born to parents on the bottom rung of the income ladder remain at the bottom as adults. These children tend not to have the range of opportunities that have long characterized the American experience. Discusses a biblical view of wealth and poverty. Before the implementation of many of the Great Society programs. Efforts to alleviate the effects of poverty among working-class and poor families through direct. The Great Depression of the 1930s. The Great Society was a set of domestic programs in the United States launched by Democratic President Lyndon B. National Historic Preservation Act of 1966. The Progressive Era refers to. Rockefeller's General Education Board and the John F. Slater Fund provided considerable funding of county training programs. Unlike the New Deal of the 1930s and the 'Great Society. Lyndon Johnson's 'Great Society'. The Voting Rights Act banned literacy tests and other discriminatory methods of denying suffrage.For example, the aggregate impact of child poverty in the United States leads to reduced skills development and economic productivity, increased crime, and poorer health, all of which is conservatively estimated by recent research to cost the United States more than $6. That one in five children in the richest nation in the world should live in poverty is a moral failing. But it also compromises our country. A 2. 2 percent poverty rate among our children not only costs Americans 5 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) every year, but it also sidelines huge pockets of untapped talent, creating barriers to the educational opportunities and skills development all children need to join an American economy built to last. The impact of poverty is severe wherever it is felt but even as the spatial distribution of poverty changes, with higher increases in suburban communities, we recognize that its impact is particularly acute in America. More than 1. 0 million people live with the problems of concentrated neighborhood poverty. This tells us that when it comes to addressing poverty in America, place matters. And locally based community developers are at the heart of an evolution in building the infrastructure necessary to provide support to families experiencing poverty, whether in suburbs first confronting these challenges or neighborhoods beset by distress over decades. As community developers have long recognized, the problems that contribute to poverty are very much interconnected. While poverty cannot be explained as merely a consequence of housing, education, and health, each poses unique challenges to low- income families at the community level. For example, the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act (Recovery Act) kept nearly 7 million Americans out of poverty, and poverty was lessened for 3. Several of the administration. Well- timed and targeted tax credits, which included modest expansions in the Earned Income Tax Credit and Child Tax Credit as well as a Making Work Pay tax credit that offset payroll taxes, helped keep more than 3 million Americans, mostly those in families with children, out of poverty. These tax credits, particularly the Making Work Pay credit, also reached middle- class families, providing help to those families and buttressing our economy. Modest expansions and further outreach for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits kept many families out of poverty and meant there was no increase in child hunger or food insecurity despite the severe economic downturn. Indeed, during the past three years, the Obama administration has worked hard to put Americans back to work while building a foundation to address poverty and create ladders of opportunity for all Americans. The $7 billion invested through the Neighborhood Stabilization Program not only fought decline and blight in hard- hit communities, but it is also on track to create 9. More than 4. 00,0. Recovery Act, ensuring that teachers remained in classrooms and children continued learning. Through the Recovery Act, the Obama administration invested in summer and year- round jobs for disadvantaged youth, which placed more than 3. This is perhaps the greatest challenge now facing our society. What were the multiplier effects of federal expenditures? The Great Recession forced families and communities to confront the worst economic collapse most of. The effects of the crisis were most severe for low. Fighting Poverty through Community Development. In addition, investments in the Recovery Act placed more than 2. Recognizing that education is a key to success, the Obama administration has made historic investments to ensure that all children enter school ready to learn and all Americans have access to a complete and competitive education, from cradle- to- career. Typically, educational failure clusters in communities of need. Lack of school readiness among the youngest children, chronically poor- performing elementary and secondary schools, and limited postsecondary completion compound and sustain intergenerational poverty. But integrated approaches can overcome these persistent challenges. Many of the lowest- achieving schools targeted for improvement under Race to the Top, an Obama administration competition to encourage and reward states that are creating the conditions for innovation and reform, are located in communities where local leaders are pursuing a range of neighborhood revitalization initiatives. So are many of the lowest- achieving schools targeted for significant reforms through School Improvement Grants that support their turnaround. In addition, our investments in improving access to high- quality early education have created opportunities for program alignment and the ability for community developers to leverage improvements in educational opportunity, as the administration has expanded Head Start, invested in efforts to expand evidence- based teaching methods, and required programs that do not meet quality benchmarks to compete against others for continued Head Start funding. The Obama administration. When families lack health insurance, they not only face limited access to care, but also a far greater risk of getting sick and incurring a mountain of health care bills that can lead to financial ruin. The Affordable Care Act will expand health insurance coverage to more than 3. Americans. Many of those Americans have incomes well below the poverty line or that hover just above it but who remain ineligible for Medicaid today. Coverage means both access to care and protection against the financial risk that can come with illness. Access to affordable coverage is also critical to staying healthy and productive. The Department of Health and Human Services is working closely with community groups and states to identify those neighborhoods and areas with the highest rates of uninsured individuals to help guarantee that the Affordable Care Act brings insurance coverage to those places with populations most in need. In addition to improving coverage, we have added to the health infrastructure in the most underserved areas. With investments made possible by the Recovery Act, more than 2,8. The Affordable Care Act has continued this effort with almost 6. This focus has been accompanied by a new approach to governing, one that seeks to unlock individual and collective potential; that rewards results, evidence, and best practices over ideology; that puts people and places over programs; that rewards work and supports skill building; and that leverages the power unleashed when we join forces across all sectors. It is not enough to focus only on economic circumstances of individual families; we must also be clear- eyed about the opportunities and stressors that surround them where they live. While we. To successfully revitalize high- poverty neighborhoods, change the trajectories of kids in those neighborhoods, and compete in the twenty- first century economy, we must follow the example that innovative local actors have set across the country. The President is deeply familiar with how poverty connects to every aspect of a family. The President knows fighting poverty requires flexibility, adaptability, and above all, a comprehensive focus. That is why, in describing the Harlem Children. Long before President Obama took office, community developers had recognized that rebuilding educational opportunities for children trapped in neighborhoods of concentrated poverty was just as important as rebuilding the neighborhoods themselves. They had seen how reducing homelessness was inextricably tied to our ability to provide behavioral health and other wrap- around services. And they understood that when the government does not act alone, but as a leader among private and nonprofit partners, these goals become achievable. To take the innovative solutions developed at the neighborhood level across the entire country, we have focused on five fundamental principles: Do what works. We have identified innovative policies that improve economic mobility, considered new ideas with a strong theoretical base, and scaled up promising approaches that have begun to show good evidence. Use a clear set of measurable results. Is Poverty Still Falling in Venezuela? One of the biggest social achievements claimed by Venezuela’s Bolivarian government is the significant reduction in poverty levels witnessed over the previous fifteen years. Opponents have traditionally addressed this by criticising the way poverty is measured, putting poverty reduction down to high oil prices and unsustainable “largesse” in public spending, or by ignoring the matter altogether and focusing on other issues where the government’s performance is seen as less successful. However there has been renewed focus on poverty recently in the oil rich nation of 3. This is due to a report by the government’s National Statistics Institute (INE) indicating that household income poverty rose 6 percentage points from the second half of 2. As such, the question has been raised over whether the gains made in poverty reduction during the presidency of Hugo Chavez (1. President Nicolas Maduro (2. This article examines the claim in light of the latest statistics on poverty, as well as looking at current poverty reduction policies being implemented in Venezuela. Are Chavez- Era Gains In Poverty Reduction “Over”? The above graph shows the changes to household income poverty 2. It demonstrates how the net effect of the fluctuations in the poverty rate during 2. Source: INEThe INE’s statistics record the change to the income poverty rate every six months. They show that in the first half of 2. However poverty fell six percentage points in the second semester (half) of 2. It then immediately increased again by eight points in early 2. In the second semester of 2. The possible causes of these changes will be explored below. However it appears that the overall result of these fluctuations was to maintain the historically low poverty rate reached in recent years and not to result in a net increase in poverty: income poverty was the same in late 2. Leading papers such as Spain’s El Pa. The statistics were reported in a similar manner by outlets such as Bloomberg, Reuters and Venezuela’s El Universal conservative daily. Juan Nagel, an anti- government blogger with Caracas Chronicles, argued in Foreign Policy Magazine that the increase had undone Chavez- era gains in poverty reduction and had created a new class of “emerging poor”, who he claimed had been the protagonists of the opposition’s unrest movement earlier this year. This latter assertion contrasts with the middle and upper class opposition protesters seen on the streets by reporters from the New York Times, the BBC, the UK Guardian, the Centre for Economic and Policy Research, and Venezuelanalysis. Nagel also reiterated the perspective that poverty was only brought down in the mid 2. However a closer examination of the statistics suggests that the claim that changes in poverty during 2. Firstly, such reports take the increase in income poverty out of context by not mentioning the poverty rate’s unusual drop in semester II 2. Secondly, the exclusive focus on income poverty ignores the other main indicator of poverty in Venezuela – structural poverty – whose performance arguably reveals more about long term poverty trends in the country. This measurement shows that structural poverty has continued decreasing despite current economic problems, reaching a record low over the past year. As such, the exclusive focus on the increase in income poverty which occurred in the first half of 2. Chavismo. However it isn’t very helpful for understanding wider poverty trends in Venezuela and the extent to which current policies may or may not be contributing to poverty reduction. These issues will now be examined. How Poverty is Measured in Venezuela. There are two methods used to measure poverty in Venezuela, which are recognised and utilised by international organisations such as the UN’s Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC). The first is income poverty. This measurement is based on a calculation of income versus living costs, and as such reacts to fluctuations in wages and inflation. In Venezuela the poverty line is calculated as the cost of the basic food basket (enough to ensure an average caloric intake of 2. If per capita income for a person or household is under this line then they are considered “poor”. If income is insufficient to cover even the basic food basket alone then a person or household is considered to be “extremely poor”. The second method is structural poverty. This assesses whether a household is able to satisfy the basic needs required for its inhabitants’ well- being. It utilises the Basic Unmet Needs measurement, which measures non- monetary indicators of well- being related to services and infrastructure. The measurement is based on five variables (each with various indicators): access to primary age schooling, presence of critical overcrowding, quality of housing, access to basic public services, and level of economic dependency (based on education and employment). This makes the measurement less susceptible to fluctuations in income and inflation. If one of the five basic needs is unmet in a household, then it is considered “poor”. If a household has two or more unmet needs, it is considered “extremely poor”. Therefore, while both measures have recognised utility in evaluating living standards and social wellbeing, the income poverty method assesses poverty based on what standard of living a given income should guarantee, while the structural method assesses what basic needs are being guaranteed in a given society. Poverty in the Bolivarian Era. In the past fifteen years both the income and structural poverty measures have shown a significant net reduction. Household income poverty reduced from 4. Meanwhile structural poverty fell from 2. If anything, these figures conceal the extent of poverty reduction in the 2. The opposition’s forced shut down of the oil industry in 2. Hugo Chavez from office through extra- constitutional means, resulted in great economic havoc, causing the country to enter a recession and annual inflation to rocket to 3. In this context household income poverty shot up to a peak of 5. Structural poverty also increased slightly from 2. How has the large decrease in poverty been achieved and maintained during this period, which has included two recessions (2. Income poverty This graph shows the evolution of household income poverty in Venezuela over the 1. The blue line shows the poverty rate and the red line shows the extreme poverty rate. The pink background represents the period since the Bolivarian government came to power. Source: INE After overcoming the opposition’s oil industry shutdown in early 2. GDP growth, increased formal job creation and concomitant shrinking of the informal labour market, comparatively low inflation, above- inflation minimum wage increases, and the expansion of the state pension and other welfare benefits as part of Chavez- era social programs known as “missions”. This poverty level, including recent fluctuations, has been maintained to the present. Income based household poverty 1. This first red circle highlights the plateau in poverty reduction reached in 2. The second indicates the ups and downs of 2. Source: INEThe changes in the poverty rate from the first half of 2. Why did this occur? The six percentage point drop in the first half of 2. At the time critics argued that this increase in public spending would lead to “economic adjustments” in 2. In this context, and following his re- election in October 2. Hugo Chavez’s death from cancer in March 2. This coincided with the currency devaluation in February 2. Bolivarian era high of 5. Meanwhile the government was perhaps slow to act on the developing situation in light of Chavez’s death and the snap presidential election held following his passing. These problems, particularly the sharp increase in food prices, were likely responsible for the net increase in income poverty during the previous year. That poverty actually decreased by two percentage points in the second half of 2. Maduro administration’s three- tiered minimum wage increase that year and other measures taken in response to the inflationary situation. Other factors could also have contributed to the maintenance of poverty at the post 2. These include low unemployment, which at 7. April was the lowest rate recorded for that month in the past 1. Chavez took office in 1. Inequality in income distribution has also remained at its reduced level, falling marginally last year. According to the Gini coefficient indicator of income equality - the INE stated recently - Venezuela continues to be the least unequal country in Latin America. Venezuela’s Gini index score was 0. According to the INE, in 1. Structural poverty The graph shows the reduction in structural poverty from 1. The blue line shows overall structural poverty, and the red line shown extreme structural poverty. Source: INEAs structural poverty is measured by non- monetary factors, this has not been as subject to recent fluctuations in wages and inflation. Rather, a gradual but inexorable reduction in structural poverty has occurred over the previous decade. In 2. 01. 3 structural poverty reached 1. This has occurred over the past 1. These programs, or “missions”, have included establishing subsidised food stores and free food kitchens, constructing a network of free health clinics in communities, increasing access to free education, increasing access to basic services like electricity and potable water, and constructing or renovating over half a million homes since 2. These programs have contributed to improvements in many indicators of social well- being, several of which have a direct bearing on structural poverty. For example between 2. It is difficult to see this as a short term populist spending strategy that has not had a significant long term impact on poverty reduction, as some critics have claimed.
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