Above: "Boy Artist at Transient Shelter," a lithograph by Elizabeth Olds (1896-1991), created while she was in the New Deal's Public Works of Art Project, 1934. How many children today sit in homeless shelters and dream of a better life? And how many realize, despite all the happy-talk to the contrary, that it's unlikely, because of the greed and selfishness of the American caste system? Image courtesy of the General Services Administration and the Nebraska State Historical Society.
As the super-rich keep hoarding wealth, evading taxes, and refusing to give American workers a significant raise, child homelessness remains a major problem in the United States. For example, in 2016 the U.S. Department of Housing and Human Services (DHHS) reported: "Homelessness is a reality for many families with young children in our country. In fact, infancy is the period of life when a person is at highest risk of living in a homeless shelter in the United States... Experiences of homelessness in early childhood are associated with poor early development and educational well-being" ("Early Childhood Homelessness in the United States: 50-State Profile," January 2016, available here).
Childhood homelessness occurs just about everywhere in America. In Kentucky, the DHHS report shows that 10.6% of children in Kentucky under the age of 6 experience homelessness. Meanwhile, "New York City remains in the midst of the worst crisis of homelessness since the Great Depression, with more than 62,000 men, women, and children sleeping in shelters each night. A chronic shortage of affordable housing and the potent combination of rising rents and stagnant wages have fueled a daunting and unabated 79 percent increase in the demand for shelter in the last decade... The City has made far too little progress for the 45,000 children staying in shelters each year. The number of children in shelters remains at record levels" ("State of the Homeless 2017," Coalition for the Homeless, available here).
The problem of child homelessness is so bad that it's developed its own lingo. For example, homeless high school students are sometimes referred to as "couch surfers or couch hoppers," because, lacking a permanent residency of their own, they stay at various shelters and friends' homes ("Number of homeless children and adults in America has increased," The Philadelphia Tribune, June 28, 2016).
How will our Republican federal government address child homelessness? Answer: They will give massive tax cuts to the super-rich. Not more affordable housing, not an increase in the earned income credit, not a public works program for the unemployed, but massive tax cuts... for the super-rich "job creators" who have failed so miserably at creating good-paying jobs. Republicans are working hard, for example, to repeal the estate tax (a tax paid only by the rich) so that even more dynastic wealth can be passed down from generation to generation. This will solidify America's developing caste system - those born into great wealth will live in great luxury and those born into poverty will remain in poverty, struggling all their lives with low wages and high debt (see, e.g., "Poor at 20, Poor for Life: A new study indicates that from the 1980s to the 2000s, it became less likely that a worker could move up the income ladder," The Atlantic, July 14, 2016).
In the Bible, Christ says we should avoid hoarding wealth and, instead, help the poor (see, e.g., Matthew 19: 20-24). But in America today, with the strong support of many evangelicals (who voted for Trump, a man who says, "I'm a very greedy person") we help the super-rich get richer and scold the poor - calling them "takers," "parasites," and "lazy good-for-nothings." And then, the political right (the group that facilitates most of this wealth-hoarding and name-calling) has the nerve to declare America "A Christian Nation!!"
Isn't that amazing? I mean... isn't that just jaw-dropping, eye-crossing, pull-your-hair-out amazing? Wow!
Childhood homelessness occurs just about everywhere in America. In Kentucky, the DHHS report shows that 10.6% of children in Kentucky under the age of 6 experience homelessness. Meanwhile, "New York City remains in the midst of the worst crisis of homelessness since the Great Depression, with more than 62,000 men, women, and children sleeping in shelters each night. A chronic shortage of affordable housing and the potent combination of rising rents and stagnant wages have fueled a daunting and unabated 79 percent increase in the demand for shelter in the last decade... The City has made far too little progress for the 45,000 children staying in shelters each year. The number of children in shelters remains at record levels" ("State of the Homeless 2017," Coalition for the Homeless, available here).
The problem of child homelessness is so bad that it's developed its own lingo. For example, homeless high school students are sometimes referred to as "couch surfers or couch hoppers," because, lacking a permanent residency of their own, they stay at various shelters and friends' homes ("Number of homeless children and adults in America has increased," The Philadelphia Tribune, June 28, 2016).
How will our Republican federal government address child homelessness? Answer: They will give massive tax cuts to the super-rich. Not more affordable housing, not an increase in the earned income credit, not a public works program for the unemployed, but massive tax cuts... for the super-rich "job creators" who have failed so miserably at creating good-paying jobs. Republicans are working hard, for example, to repeal the estate tax (a tax paid only by the rich) so that even more dynastic wealth can be passed down from generation to generation. This will solidify America's developing caste system - those born into great wealth will live in great luxury and those born into poverty will remain in poverty, struggling all their lives with low wages and high debt (see, e.g., "Poor at 20, Poor for Life: A new study indicates that from the 1980s to the 2000s, it became less likely that a worker could move up the income ladder," The Atlantic, July 14, 2016).
In the Bible, Christ says we should avoid hoarding wealth and, instead, help the poor (see, e.g., Matthew 19: 20-24). But in America today, with the strong support of many evangelicals (who voted for Trump, a man who says, "I'm a very greedy person") we help the super-rich get richer and scold the poor - calling them "takers," "parasites," and "lazy good-for-nothings." And then, the political right (the group that facilitates most of this wealth-hoarding and name-calling) has the nerve to declare America "A Christian Nation!!"
Isn't that amazing? I mean... isn't that just jaw-dropping, eye-crossing, pull-your-hair-out amazing? Wow!
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