“There were some times where, you know, we wouldn't have that much food, and I would tell my mom, ‘I'm not hungry, don't worry about it,’ and I lost a lot of weight. I remember I used to be a size five, and I went from a size five to...

The January jobs report from the U.S. Department of Labor was good news for the 243,000 people who found jobs. And good news for the American economy as the unemployment rate fell to 8.3 percent, the lowest level in nearly three years. This is the 16th straight month of jobs...

In his State of the Union address, President Obama spoke about his grandparents, who were part of the World War II “generation of heroes” who “built the strongest economy and middle class the world has ever known.” The President said, “My grandfather, a veteran of Patton’s Army, got the chance...

Alabama has passed the toughest immigration enforcement law in the country. Now children born in the U.S.A., American citizens, are living in fear. Some children are afraid to go to school. According to Bill Lawrence, principal of Foley Elementary in Foley, Alabama, “Most of these kids are American citizens. American...

“In all my courses, I really have to teach the basic messages of my life… that the rewards, the satisfactions, are not in being partner or making a million dollars, but in recognizing evils, recognizing injustices, and standing up and speaking out about them even in absolutely losing situations where...

There is nothing new about poverty. What is new, however, is that we now have the resources to get rid of it. Not too many years ago, Dr. Kirtley Mather, a Harvard geologist, wrote a book entitled Enough and to Spare. He set forth the basic theme that famine is...

As the new year’s news cycles turn to presidential politics and primary contests, there is another story our leaders should be talking a lot about -- and acting to alleviate. End-of-year news stories about holiday spending happily reported on the unexpectedly high totals many Americans spent -- or put on...

When Britany Lewis was born, no trumpets and glad tidings or even balloons and baby showers greeted her arrival. She was just another poor baby. Britany never knew her father, and for the first six years of her life lived in virtual squalor with five siblings and a...

“That Fred Shuttlesworth did not become a martyr was not for lack of trying… There was not a person in the civil rights movement who put himself in the position of being killed more often than Fred Shuttlesworth.” This quote from Andrew Manis, author of Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth’s biography A...

A friend shared a story I love about our mutual friend and mentor Rev. William Sloane Coffin, Jr. some years ago. It was Christmas Eve and the pews at New York City’s Riverside Church were packed. The Christmas pageant was underway and had come to the point at which the...

God help us to end poverty in our time.

The poverty of having a child with too little to eat and no place to sleep, no air, sunlight and space to breathe, bask, and grow.

The poverty of watching your child suffer hunger or get sicker and sicker and not...

Would you recognize a poor child when you saw one? Nine-year-old Carolyn Latimore and her sister Aalijah, eight, are beautiful little girls with big smiles on their faces. But Carolyn, Aalijah, and their older brother, Robert, 17, of Middletown, Ohio, fell into poverty when their parents divorced. They’ve lived in...

As a teenager, many of Barbara Johns' wildest fantasies were about a surprising subject: a new school. “My imagination would run rampant -- and I would dream that some mighty man of great wealth built us a new school building or that our parents got together and surprised us with...

“Being hungry is possibly the worst feeling anyone could ever experience, and honestly, when you’re hungry, you can’t be productive, and you can’t really do anything. And I just remember, sometimes in school I would definitely be hungry,” said 17-year-old New York City high school senior Ninaad Dave. During the...

Aristotle got it right when he said, “All who have meditated on the art of governing mankind have been convinced that the fate of empires depends on the education of youth.” Once upon a time America professed to believe in a strong public education system—at least for some children. And...

I’m often asked, what’s wrong with our children? Too often we focus on the negative without celebrating young people who, despite the odds unfairly stacked against them, overcome great adversity, demonstrate academic excellence, and give back to their community and country. Each year, the Children’s Defense Fund (CDF) takes time...

Picture an iceberg. Many children know the danger from the “Titanic Song” they learn in school or summer camp. One verse goes like this: “It was off the coast of England not very far from shore, when the rich refused to associate with the poor. So they sent them down...

Repatriation. It's a word many schoolchildren probably haven't yet learned to define or even seen very often outside of spelling bees. But when it comes to corporate taxes, repatriation is the cornerstone of an idea that has the potential to severely hurt millions of children and parents and widen the...

“The Economy Stupid” were the words on the now famous sign in successful presidential candidate Bill Clinton’s 1992 war room. Today, that sign should be in the war rooms of all candidates—from those seeking the presidency down to those running for local office. And right below it should be three...

Is poverty in America becoming normalized? Have 16.4 million children living in poverty become an accepted part of American life? The answer seems to be yes because the conversation in Washington and state capitals these days is not about reducing child poverty but about reducing survival programs for struggling families....