Fighting Poverty: Attentive Policy Can Make a Huge Difference

John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Subscription Department, 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030-5774. Tel: 800-825-7550; Tel: 201-748-6645; Fax: 201-748-6021; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/browse/?type=JOURNAL

Y

7

Poverty; Public Policy; Children; Poverty Programs; Welfare Services; Program Effectiveness; Foreign Countries

United Kingdom; United States

10.1002/pam.20498

0276-8739

This article discusses the implication of the implementation of anti-poverty policy in both the United Kingdom and the United States. International studies of child poverty usually find that the United States and United Kingdom are at the bottom of the league table in terms of child poverty. Indeed, the U.S. and U.K do not fare well in international child poverty comparisons even when a U.S.-style absolute poverty line is used. But the situation of low-income children in these two countries has diverged drastically over the past decade, as the United Kingdom has implemented an ambitious, national government-led antipoverty initiative, while the United States, in contrast, has focused on cutting the welfare rolls and welfare dependence in spite of high child poverty. The U.K. antipoverty initiative was more ambitious than the U.S. welfare reforms, not just in the scale of its investments, but also in the scope of policy efforts included. The absolute poverty rate for U.K. children fell to 13 percent by 2004/05 and has remained at this level through 2007/08, while the official U.S. child poverty rate was 18 percent in 2007 and rose to 19 percent in 2008, according to the most recent United States Census Bureau estimates. The author concludes that a more concerted national effort will be needed if the United States is to achieve anything like the United Kingdom. (Contains 1 figure.) [Kenneth Couch edited this article.]

ERIC

26

2010

EJ881421