These findings are reported in the book Child Well-Being, Child Poverty and Child Policy in Modern Nations , which is the product of 45 authors from three continents that make up the Luxembourg Income Study. It is the first time that child poverty levels have been measured taking into account taxes and benefits for individual US states, which allows direct comparisons between US states and other nations. New York state has the highest rate of child poverty, with 26.3 percent of its children living in poverty. California ranks second with a 25.7 percent rate. Despite high rates of economic growth and improvements in the standard of living in industrialized nations throughout the twentieth century, a significant percentage of our children are still living in families that are so poor that normal health and growth are at risk.
Lets face it.
The United States as a whole and New York in particular has some of the greatest income inequalities of anywhere in the world. New York has some of the richest people in the world, yet there is still massive poverty. All one has to do is walk down 5th Avenue from 125th Street to 90th Street to see the full range. Lisa Ellibe lives in Pennsylvania, where the childhood poverty rate is 18.4 percent. The World Socialist Web Site spoke to Lisa at a soup kitchen in McKeesport, Pennsylvania where she had come to pick up food for herself and her baby.