Author: Siya

With a nationwide rate of 565, 000 people experiencing homelessness on any given day, emergency shelter, and transitional housing programs are only putting a dent in this overgrowing population of less fortunate individuals. While the poverty rate increases to 47 million people, many of these low-income families also experience homelessness, as a result of eviction or foreclosure of their previous homes. This isn’t always the fault of the households, since the cost of living in major cities has become difficult for many lower, and middle class families. If we can increase the amount of transitional housing programs in developing areas, where the population consists greatly of poverty-stricken families, the rate of homelessness will go down significantly, as the emergency shelters become a means of temporary arrangements until families can get back on their feet. Along with the creation of more shelters, there has to be concern about the ongoing violence and theft that occurs within these programs, consequently prompting many individuals to live on the streets, rather than asking for help.

– Siya Sharma (10th Grade Student, Santa Clara, CA)

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More than 32% of the nation’s families are low income households. With a rise in low-income students, school districts support these families, through reduced pay lunch and other benefits. After school ends, how do students provide themselves with the basic necessities of life, consequently when they aren’t given these means of financial aid? Poverty is a recurrent topic of the news, but as a society, we haven’t helped these people to our full potential. If half of the world’s population, more than 3 billion people, live off $2.50 a day, is it because they were born to live in a state of destitution, or because we haven’t assisted enough to minimize this ever growing population of penury stricken individuals?

When we think of poverty, the first thing that comes to mind is undernourishment, and the sad reality of unequal wealth distribution. The richest people would have to contribute 60 billion dollars in order to end global poverty annually, which only happens to be ¼ of their overall income. What we don’t realize, is that 1 billion children are living in poverty, and 22,000 children die everyday because of hunger, and lack of healthcare, due to their financial situation. Children that are born into a state of destitution, have a higher chance of contracting diseases, such as tuberculosis and malaria, since they cannot afford vaccinations to prevent these illnesses. Low income students have a higher chance of developing cognitive disabilities, and are seven times more likely to drop out of high school, than those from families with higher income. Poverty isn’t just one issue, but a daily obstacle in many aspects of a child’s life. From unsafe drinking water, to an increase in illiteracy rates, impoverished families aren’t able to provide the basic necessities needed to thrive in an evolving world. Our contribution as a society, is to restore the lives of low-income families, and make sure that global poverty develops into a nonexistent problem, that no one should face.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                          – Siya Sharma (10th Grade Student, Santa Clara, CA)

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In a capitalist economy, the top 20% owns most of the nation’s money, leaving the lower and middle class to survive off 7% of the United States’ overall affluence. Our understanding of “ideal” wealth distribution is heavily inaccurate, making us believe that the nation’s money is dispersed in an equitable system, with the bottom 80% and top 20% battling it out for a 50-50 share of 84.9 trillion dollars. In reality, Americans are underestimating the gap between the rich and the rest of the population, because nearly 47 million people are living in poverty, and the elite take more than half of the nation’s earnings in any given year. In a 2011 study conducted by Harvard business professor Mike Norton, and economist Dan Ariely, it was discovered that 92% of Americans “ideal” of what wealth distribution looks like in our nation, was extremely flawed. What we don’t realize, is that the wealth designated to the top 20% in actuality, is the affluence of the top 1%, and the rest of our nation’s people must work 380 times harder than the upper class, to make the same income. This imbalance of the distribution of wealth is not just limited to our nation’s earnings, but also in other areas. For example, most of our wealth is divided up into financial instruments such as, stocks, bonds, and mutual funds, and the top 1% owns half of the stock market, while the bottom 50% only owns half a percent. This is because the upper class can afford to invest, while the lower class is on the verge of poverty, and these large amounts of people are barely scraping by. Wealth inequality is a major issue facing our nation, and it has caused 15% of our nation to live in a state of destitution. Instead of resorting to other means to fix this problem, we should educate ourselves, and realize that wealth distribution in America isn’t as just as we thought it was, and we should work towards a long-term sustainable solution.

– Siya Sharma (10th Grade Student, Santa Clara, CA)

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There are currently over 16 million children in the United States living in poverty. This is nearly 1/5 of the total population of children living in our country, which means 1 in 5 children in US are living in poverty and cannot afford basic needs such as food & shelter. These children are living in households with an average income below $23K for a family of four. It takes more than this much income to provide the basic expenses needed for food, water, shelter, clothing, health care, and education. Children are usually impacted the most from living in such extreme poverty. For example, they are less healthy, lack others in terms of intellectual development, and are more likely to not complete high school or receive a college education. As adults, these children usually continue to face the issue of poverty along with their families.

More than half of these poverty-stricken households have to face issues in receiving basic education. Illnesses such as high blood pressure and diabetes are prevalent in these homes. Because of rising housing costs, 1/6 of these families have experienced eviction, or a foreclosure of their homes. In fact, 93% of poor households struggle to cope with their increasing housing, utility, and education costs, and compromise on paying bills, just to buy food. In an average household struggling with poverty, adequate employment is hard to find due to lack of education, and the rarity of finding a full-time job.

Of all the issues that these families are faced with, food insecurity ranks at the top. Sadly, because of this food insecurity, health care, housing, and education are compromised to provide substantial food quantities to the children in such households. A lack in income results into dependency on some 200 food banks and 600,000 food pantries around the United States that help out households needing assistance to provide adequate food supply to their families. Because of the increase in poverty stricken households, food banks are serving almost 46.5 million people across the United States, which is 1/7 of the total population. Out of which, some 12 million are young children, and 7 million are seniors.

Sadly, as poverty rates have increased by nearly five percent since 2007, so have the cuts in some government sponsored programs. Just to take an example, the $8.6 billion in Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits that have been cut in the legislation known as the 2014 Farm Bill. This legislation cuts SNAP benefits, such as food stamps that are given to more than 45 million people living in poverty. These cuts affect about 800,000 – 900,000 households (or approximately 4% of people who rely on food stamps).  Some argue that the cuts close a loophole known as “heat and eat” where some of the states leverage their Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program assistance, or LIHEAP assistance to provide SNAP benefits to low-income families.  Advocates of these cuts say that those families receive more SNAP benefits than they should.  Others argue that this loophole is necessary to provide the poor families much needed benefits.

Whatever the reasons may be; whether it is insufficient government funding, economy, lack of basic education or lack of enough opportunities for people at the bottom resulting in growing income inequalities, the fact is that a very significant percentage of the total population of the most powerful nation on the face of earth lives under alarming poverty where the poor (especially children) & destitute do not have access to the very ‘Basic Necessities’ of life. Necessities that most of us, if not all, take for granted.

As we make new resolutions for ourselves & hope our wishes come true, we must not forget the ones that are downtrodden. We must remember that there are many around us in despair who also have ‘Small Aspirations’ they hope will be fulfilled someday.

– Siya Sharma (10th Grade Student, Santa Clara, CA)

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