Last night in Obama’s acceptance speech, he brought up an issue that we must keep at the forefront of this election: paid family leave and paid sick days. He laid out a compelling vision of what a strong America looks like when he said:

We measure the strength of our economy not by the number of billionaires we have or the profits of the Fortune 500, but by whether someone with a good idea can take a risk and start a new business, or whether the waitress who lives on tips can take a day off to look after a sick kid without losing her job - an economy that honors the dignity of work.

After eight years of Republican rule, our country looks nothing like this. When families find themselves in crisis and ask, “How can I keep my paycheck and care for my family in the face of this emergency?”…the answer for most people is “you can’t.” Working moms and dads have to make painful decisions about whether they take time off to care for a new baby or have enough money to buy diapers. The leadership of the supposed “family friendly” party has done very little to make life easier for American families.

Here are some facts to consider:

• The Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) has given more than 50 million Americans the ability to support their families. However, because leave is unpaid, many families that have taken leave face economic hardship. Of the people who do not take FMLA, 78 percent say they could not afford to take leave.
• In the United States, only 51 percent of people get paid leave through their work to care for families.
• Almost half - 48 percent - of workers in the private sector get no paid sick days.
• Among low-wage workers the number with out paid sick days are even more dramatic: nearly 80 percent do not get any paid sick days.

We can do better for working Americans. We must do better for working Americans. If Barack Obama is elected in November we must hold him to last night’s pledge:

Now is the time to help families with paid sick days and better family leave, because nobody in America should have to choose between keeping their jobs and caring for a sick child or ailing parent.

Three years ago, Hurricane Katrina devastated the Gulf Coast and exposed the depth of American poverty and inequality. And here we are three years later as the Gulf Coast braces for yet another potentially devastating hurricane.

Yet, with even with a new hurricane on its way, most media outlets and political leaders have forgotten about the Gulf Coast recovery and have failed to seriously address the poverty that it revealed.  Very few political leaders are even talking about the Katrina anniversary or the potential disaster this new hurricane could cause (Although, there have been some reports that the GOP is worried about how Hurricane Gustav could affect their convention).  Today, Facing South, the blog for the Institute for Southern Studies’ highlights just how little attention the anniversary of Katrina is getting:

Almost three years after Hurricanes Katrina and Rita and the breakdown of Louisiana’s federally constructed levee system, the media, Congress, the White House, our Presidential candidates and even, surprisingly, the progressive community have for the most part moved on.

Fewer and fewer national media organizations regularly cover the region’s recovery and wall-to-wall coverage of the DNC and RNC Conventions in late August will likely keep media interest in the third anniversary of Hurricane Katrina to a bare minimum.

Furthermore, they note:

Sources within the Presidential campaigns of Senator John McCain and Senator Barack Obama believe it is unlikely either candidate will spend Katrina’s anniversary in the Gulf Coast.  Neither campaign has even committed to attending the YouTube/Google Forum in New Orleans on September 18th to discuss the region’s recovery, among other issues.

Both Barack Obama and John McCain released official statements regarding yesterday’s census report. Here are the highlights:

Barack Obama:

Today’s news confirms what America’s struggling families already know - that over the past seven years our economy has moved backwards. We have now lived through first so-called economic ‘expansion’ on record where typical families saw their incomes fall, and working-age households lost more than $2,000 from their paychecks. Another 816,000 Americans fell into poverty in 2007 - including nearly 500,000 children - bringing the total increase in Americans in poverty under President Bush to 5.7 million. And on Bush’s watch, an additional 7.2 million Americans have fallen into the ranks of the uninsured.

John McCain:

Today’s announcement reminds us that Americans are suffering in a struggling economy. Too many of our neighbors are living in poverty, too many can’t find a job, and too many are living without health insurance.

Neither candidate mentions that next year, regardless of who sits in the oval office, these statistics will be worse. Like, I mentioned yesterday, the 2007 numbers do not account for the economic downturn that we’ve experienced this year.

Obama and McCain can point fingers now about who’s to blame for the stagnation in poverty reduction, but one of them will have the ultimate responsibility of easing the economic burdens facing low- and middle-income Americans.

Barack Obama has pledged to cut poverty in half in ten years and has outlined an extensive set of proposals to bring economic opportunity to all Americans. The same thing can’t be said about the Republican nominee. Though John McCain has said that he will “make the eradication of poverty a top priority of the McCain Administration,” Matt Yglesias reminds us that he has no official poverty reduction strategy.

The U.S. Census Bureau released their annual income, poverty and health insurance coverage statistics today. Here are the quick facts:

• Real median household income increased by 1.3 percent between 2006 and 2007, with the national median income reaching $50,233.
• The official poverty rate remained statistically the same from 2006, at 12.5 percent.
• In 2007, 37.3 million people lived in poverty.
• The number of people without health insurance declined from 15. 8 percent (47 million people) in 2006 to 15.3 percent (47.0 million people) in 2007.

Is this good news? Not really. Let’s take a closer look at the numbers:

Income

The real median household income of $50,233 is not statistically different from the 1999 pre-recession peak, when median incomes were $50,641. This means that during the past decade, household income has virtually remained flat.

Furthermore, As Jared Bernstein of the Economic Policy Institute writes:

2007 was almost certainly the last year of the 2000s recovery, and the Census release enables us, for the first time, to evaluate how the living standards of middle- and low-income families fared over this recovery.

And:

Because for most of 2007, the economy wasn’t in the shape it’s in now, and usually — not always — in the last year of an expansion, poverty goes down.

Therefore, these numbers don’t account for the worst of our current economic troubles. We can expect that from now and this time next year, these statistics will decline.

Poverty

While the overall poverty rate did not increase, it is hard to celebrate the fact that 37.3 million people in America live in poverty. What’s more alarming, poverty rates for children below the age of 18 increased from 17.4 percent (12.8 million children) in 2006 to 18.0 percent (13.3 million children) in 2007.

The poverty rates among racial groups show that we certainly have not reached a point of equal opportunities for upward mobility. Among non-Hispanic Whites the poverty rate in 2007 was 8.2, among Blacks the rate was 24.5, among Asians the rate was 10.2, and among Hispanics the poverty rate was 21.5.

Furthermore, after falling sharply in the 1990s, the poverty rate has remained flat during the past decade. Overall, the picture is one of stalled momentum, and America continues to lag other advanced nations when it comes to using public policy to help citizens lift themselves from poverty.

Health Insurance Coverage

An increase in the number of people with health insurance coverage is good news. However, in 2007, there was no statistical change in the number of people covered by private health insurance (202 million people) from 2006. The number of people covered by government health insurance increased from 80.3 million people in 2006 to 83.0 million people in 2007. Think what the numbers would look like if we had followed the lead of the current president and completely privatized health care.

While the number of overall children with health insurance coverage increased, the coverage rates for children in poverty decreased to 17.6 percent in 2007, from 19.3 percent in 2006.

Again, these numbers do not represent the worst of our current economic problems. There is no doubt that the next president must make poverty reduction and social mobility a top priority. I am looking forward to see how both Obama and McCain campaigns address these new statistics.

Last week reporters and political junkies hung on every word from the Obama campaign hoping to find a clue of who would complete the Democratic ticket. While many American’s were tucked snuggly in their beds on Friday night, CNN ran live feeds of the top three potential VP nominees’ front doors.

Now that the suspense is finally over, how can we get reporters to anxiously await something just as important about the future of the country: the release of the annual Census data on poverty, income, and the number of uninsured Americans? While, these numbers tell us what happened in 2007, the data can guide us about how to best help low-income American’s in the future.

Policy experts across the political and ideological spectrum have made predictions about what we will learn tomorrow. According to a New York Sun article:

The annual report provides grist for both parties in the high-pitched debate over the economy, and both liberal and conservative analysts predict the new data will yield little good news.

The number of Americans without health insurance is expected to rise, analysts from the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute and the right-leaning American Enterprise Institute said. The predictions diverge on the poverty rate, with AEI expecting a slight increase and a senior economist at EPI, Jared Bernstein, forecasting a small drop.

Regardless of whose predictions prove correct, there are a couple things to keep in mind as we wait for the release:

• First, these numbers represent the “official poverty rate.” Experts across the board agree that this measure does not properly account for the number of Americans that live in poverty. New York City recently updated its definition of poor. Watch for this debate to continue.

• Second, expect both campaigns to pick and choose nuggets of information from the report to boost their arguments. Like John Adams famously said, “Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passion, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence.” Regardless of our political persuasions, low-income Americans will be best served if elected officials and policy makers honestly use the data to drive policy proposals.

For people who care about poverty reduction and social mobility, what we learn tomorrow will help us paint a better picture of the struggles of low-income Americans. Now, if only we could get CNN’s John King to stake out the Census Bureau waiting for clues of the results will show.

The wait is over: Barack Obama picked Sen. Joe Biden for the number two spot. If you need a break from the media chatter about the Obama/Biden ticket and what it means politically, check out this analysis of Biden from the lense of what he will do for low-income Americans.

The Washington Post reports today that DC public schools will try a tactic to boost academic performance among city middle school students: offering payments of cash up to $100 per month for high achievement. The incentive program, which is scheduled begin in October in 14 of the 28 middle schools in the District, will reward students who attend class regularly, show up on time, turn in homework, earn high grades and display good behavior.

According to the article the plan has drawn criticism from some parents and education activists like, “Alfie Kohn, an independent researcher whose book, ‘Punished by Rewards,’ details the downside of such programs, [and has] said incentives ‘undermine the very thing you’re trying to promote by getting them hooked on the rewards.’”

DC isn’t the first to use cash as a method to increase student performance. New York City mayor, Michael Bloomberg, made waves last summer when he announced his Opportunity NYC agenda, which includes a pilot program that gives money to fourth and seventh graders who make high grades on standardized tests. Speaking at last year’s Brookings event, “Briefing on the Census Poverty Report,” Bloomberg noted that his plan is controversial but said:

Now, you might say - “But why should we pay people for doing what they’re supposed to do?” It’s a fair question - but think of it this way: Every other anti-poverty program that’s been tried has failed to get the national poverty rate below 11 percent. So what are the options? Do nothing? Or dress-up the failed old ideas?

We have other options - but only if we’re not afraid of thinking outside the box, even if that means breaking taboos. And let’s face it: If we had been afraid of breaking taboos in the 1990s, requiring mothers to work never would have happened as part of the welfare reform - but now almost everyone accepts that it was a good and necessary thing.

Bloomberg’s bold statements make sense, but what do we know about cash incentives to students? Do they work? The research is limited, but early studies show promise. Yesterday, researchers at Cornell University released a study finding that states that pay students cash for passing Advanced Placement tests have seen an increase in scores on the ACT and SAT among participating students, and a rise in the number of students enrolling in college.

More time and research is needed to determine whether these cash incentives really do boost student performance. In the meantime, critics should let these pilot programs run their course so we can determine their effectiveness. Some of today’s promising social policies stem from once controversial experiments.

Yesterday, the New York Times published an article about Obama’s challenges in rural America. The author, who focuses solely on rural Pennsylvania, writes:

To roam the rural reaches of western Pennsylvania, through largely white working-class counties, is to understand the breadth of the challenge facing the two presidential candidates. But this economically ravaged region, once so solidly Democratic, poses a particular hurdle for Senator Obama.

Republicans shouldn’t celebrate yet, because many of the people interviewed were just as skeptical about McCain as they were about the Democratic nominee. It seems that neither party truly understands the extreme diversity of rural America. The Democratic Party Platform does contain a rural agenda. However, the “Real Leadership for Rural America” portion focuses solely on farming:

Rural America is home to 60 million Americans. The agricultural sector is critical to the rural economy and to all Americans. We depend on those in agriculture to produce the food, feed, fiber, and fuel that supports our society. Thankfully, American farmers possess an unrivaled capacity to produce an abundance of these high-quality products.

Contrary to popular belief, only 6 percent of the rural labor force works in the farming industry, so policies geared toward assisting agricultural communities leave out over 56 million rural Americans. A new report by the Carsey Institute at the University of New Hampshire, titled “Place Matters: Challenges and Opportunities in Four Rural Americas” highlights the complexity of rural areas. The authors break the singular “Rural America” into four, broad places and highlight their unique problems and challenges. Their categories include:

1. Amenity-Rich Rural America: areas that have picturesque scenery and small populations that draw retirees, vacationers and young families who want to raise their children in safe, small communities. Often the biggest challenges facing these places surround finding ways to assist a large aging population and how to help long-time residents who have been priced-out of their former neighborhoods.
2. Declining Resource-Dependent Rural America: places that used to depend on agriculture and manufacturing and now face economic decline and a loss of a once thriving middle-class population.
3. Chronically Poor Rural America: places that have experienced generations of entrenched poverty. They often have very few resources to attract new residents and businesses.
4. Amenity/Decline Rural America: areas that face a decline in recourses, similar to the declining resource-dependent communities, but have potential fro amenity-based growth.

Clearly these communities need very different policy prescriptions to address their problems. Like the authors of the Carsey Institute report note:

A one-size-fits all approach to policy making will not work. Policy must become more ‘place-based’ not simply in terms of geographic location, but also with awareness of social, cultural, economic, environmental and political characteristics.

Maybe if politicians, journalists and policy experts alike, truly understood the diversity of rural communities and the problems they face, fewer rural Americans would be disillusioned with our national leaders.

Yesterday the Trust for America’s Health and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation released a report showing that 37 states had an increase in adult obesity rates. No states saw a decrease in obesity rates. The statistics are startling:

• Since 1980, adult obesity rates in the U.S. have doubled from 15 percent to 30 percent
• Two-thirds of U.S. adults are overweight or obese
• Childhood obesity rates have tripled since 1980, from 6.5 percent to 16.3 percent
• The increase in obesity has created a well documented collection of health problems, including increases in type 2 diabetes; heart disease and hypertension; complications during pregnancy; and chronic diseases such as cancer, arthritis and Alzheimer’s
• The direct health care costs of obesity have grown to more than $61 billion a year

Some of you may be wondering, what this has to do with poverty. This is a poverty blog after all, and on the surface, obesity seems to fit in the health policy category. As this report points out, however, there is a relationship between obesity rates and poverty rates in many of the states:

Seven of the states with the highest poverty rates are also in the top 10 states with highest obesity rates.

Obesity doesn’t cause poverty and poverty doesn’t necessarily cause obesity, but we know that health problems are more widespread among low-income families. All too often, the poor lack sufficient access to nutritious and affordable foods, or safe areas for exercise and recreation. In addition, the unavailability of preventive-health clinics, substance-abuse programs, and mental-health counseling all impede the well-being of the disadvantaged - and limit their chances of upward mobility.

As the price of food continues to increase world-wide, we can predict an even greater decline in nutritious eating habits for American families. Eating high-calorie foods is a cheaper option for many Americans. A study by Pablo Monsivais and Adam Drewnoski, two Washington University researchers, found that high-calorie, unhealthy foods cost about $1.76 per 1,000, while low-calorie, nutritious foods cost $18.16 per 1,000 calories. For a family barely making ends meet, it’s no wonder their pantries are stocked with less desirable options.

Policy makers looking to address the obesity epidemic must look for options that bring a variety of nutritious food options to low-income communities. Fresh fruits and vegetables should not be a luxury only afforded wealthy Americans.

This month welfare reform turns twelve years old. Bill Clinton’s Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA) of 1996 changed the way we approach and talk about poverty and social policy in the United States. No longer stuck in the quagmire of big government handouts versus fend for yourself mindsets, this new brand of governing strikes a covenant with American citizens that demands responsibility in exchange for expanded opportunity from the government.

PRWORA replaced the Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) with the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF). This new federal assistance model placed a greater focus on moving recipients to the labor market through time limits that gave families only 60 months of TANF aid. The time limit provision proved to be the most controversial piece of welfare reform. Now, twelve years later, MDRC released a new report that shows time limits have not had the disastrous effects some expected:

Overall, it appears that time limits have not generated as much attention or caused as much harm to the typical family on TANF as critics feared. This is due, in part, to the fact that many of the states that serve the largest TANF caseloads - namely, California, Michigan, New York, and Pennsylvania - had not implemented strict termination time limits. In addition, most states have implemented stricter work participation requirements since welfare reform was enacted and tougher sanctioning policies. Perhaps as a result, families are not reaching state and federal time limits in large numbers. It is worth noting that the percentage of families eligible for state TANF assistance who actually receive TANF benefits has dropped sharply in the past decade, though it is difficult to determine whether time limits have contributed to this trend.

Following welfare reform, scholars have learned that a full-time job is the number one anti-poverty program. In fact, Brookings scholars Isabel Sawhill and Ron Haskins created a simulation using Census data that predicted the poverty rate assuming that one non-elderly and non-disabled family head of household worked at least full-time. They found that full-time work decreased poverty by almost a half.

The results from their second simulation might surprise some: aside from a job the next biggest poverty reduction agent is marriage. Furthermore, the authors note:

Work, marriage, education, and family size are all more powerful determinants of the incidence of poverty than the amount of cash assistance received from the government.

These lessons from the past decade can guide us as we move forward in helping all Americans scale the economic ladder. A job is critically important to climbing out of poverty. However, policy leaders must recognize that not all entry level-jobs pay enough to help families obtain a minimally decent standard of living. Also, some of our current income support policies contain a perverse disincentive for marriage, actually causing a loss of total benefits for couples who marry.

The next steps in poverty reduction must include policies that get people into the workforce, make work pay and strengthen families, such as:

• Expanding the Earned Income Tax Credit and reducing its marriage penalties
• Expanding child care options for low-income families
• Increasing access to family leave, including paid family leave
• Strengthening effective programs that encourage delayed childbearing
• And tying other government benefits to a work requirement.