Poverty and trauma

The lifetime toll of financial insecurity

Being born into a poor family in the United States almost ensures a lifetime of poverty that will trickle down to the next generation, and the one after that. Despite the intentional myth of “pulling yourself up the by bootstraps,” American systems of power are intentionally designed to foster intergenerational poverty.

“The disposition to admire, and almost to worship, the rich and the powerful, and to despise, or, at least, to neglect persons of poor and mean condition is the great and most universal cause of the corruption of our moral sentiments.”

–Adam Smith

Scottish Economist (1723-1790)

In the United States, 12 million children live in poverty. Two and a half million of those children do not have a roof over their head. In the same country, 5.5 million individuals have assets over one million dollars. That’s up 62% in the last decade.¹ Approximately 10,000 of these millionaires are worth $100 million or more. This wealth imbalance is easily correctable, but it requires a different culture and different systems of power.

Poverty in the USA is completely unnecessary. It is an artificial construct. Poor people do not wake up and decide they want to stay poor day after day. Systems of power trap poor Americans in an intentionally designed cycle designed to ensure that they stay that way. Government programs trap poor people in the cycle of poverty. Structural racism traps poor people in the cycle of poverty. Social and cultural disdain for those who are poor traps people in the cycle of poverty.

We hide the poor, force them to move from place to place, and ensure that any help they get comes with condescension and a family-sized portion of shaming. Sometimes, we throw in religious dogma to season the shame. Solvable problems get kicked down the road from one group of politicians to the next while desparation rules the lives of tens of millions of the forgotten citizens of the wealthiest country in the history of the world.

Born in the wrong ZIP code? You’ll automatically get crappy schools, food deserts, and wages so low you’ll be lucky to pay the bills working three part-time jobs with no health care. Anemic and biased social safety nets assume that everyone who needs help to survive is lazy. Why should someone barely surviving have to pay for a drug test² to keep surviving?

Why do we tolerate the costs of poverty? Eliminating it would reduce petty and serious crime, emergency room visits, education deficits, and lower suicides and substance abuse/addiction. All of these cost taxpayers in the end.

Financial insecurity affects more than half of Americans, resulting in psychological distress, instability in familes, and challenges obtaining basic staples for survival. Poor people are trapped in a constant cycle of choosing between the things they will go without: health care, paying the rent, paying the utilities, and eating.

A social and cultural shift must be implemented or America will continue its journey as the country that couldn’t care about everyone. Let’s not let that happen.

1. USA top country for millionaires and billionaires.

2. Structural barriers ensure poverty.