Advance Version of My Progressive Populist Column on Poverty
Grassroots: System FailuresAdvance Version of My Progressive Populist Column on Poverty
This is an advance copy of an upcoming column for paying subscribers. Charity is not a substitute for government action. Despite conservative and libertarian efforts to convince Americans otherwise, the philanthropic community has never been equipped to address the kind of economic uncertainty that grips more Americans than we are willing to admit. Access to good housing, quality food, and a stable income cannot be provided by small pockets of do-gooders raising pennies from their neighbors and distributing canned goods collected by Scout troops. These are systemic failings and can only be addressed through systemic solutions, ones that require government action and intervention. The latest Census data tell us that about one in 10 American live below the poverty line, while food groups say about one in eight cannot be sure whether they will have enough healthy food available on a day-to-day basis. These are more than just numbers, of course. These are real people facing real hardship who are forced to seek help from charitable organizations that themselves are left to the vicissitudes of corporate capitalism. Consider the Little Pantry in Nashville profiled in The Washington Post recently. Shifts in tax law and increases in basic costs — rent and food — have made its own survival impossible. It is closing, one of many around the country squeezed out by the inescapable logic of capitalism… Keep reading with a 7-day free trialSubscribe to Channel Surfing to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives. A subscription gets you:
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Hank Kalet 