The Value of Education

"Millions of people around the world live in informal urban communities where a lack of resources leads to degradation of the environment." When it comes to urban poverty, lack of resources such as income, clean water, or anything relating to

sanitariness affects a person's living. How can an individual escape these living conditions if there is lack of support? The government involvement is crucial when it comes to several of these problems. The government should find a way how to filter water, do charity programs giving out free food, or even find ways to make more jobs become available. People overlook the severity of poverty. They think it is just being poor but is based off of more factors than that. "Its based on the income you need to pay for rent, for water, for sanitation, for keeping your kids at school, and for healthcare” and even more that can make person in poverty.

For this blog, it is important to understand that the reason why poverty heavily exists is due to the people's lack of awareness about it. This is a main factor since there are not too many engagements with citizens in this country about urban poverty. When it comes to it, not enough people are educated about the conditions and the topic of urban poverty. Which is so ironic because there is a research that states, "Household heads’ education level was strongly correlated to household income level. This means that if the public provision of education in times of economic downturn diminishes, the asset vulnerability or urban poor populations also increases." Education is highly important but it is overlooked not by people that are in poverty, but for those that are trying to find solutions about poverty. For example, even the definition of poverty is confusing. Studies proved that "although a family might not be traditionally below the poverty line (for example, if children are generating income), it can still be vulnerable and cut off from economic and social mobility. However, for a government agency, the amount of resources necessary to evaluate households based on asset vulnerability is significantly higher than the amount of resources it takes to measure income. " This brings up a valid point on whether income or the person situation or experience defines poverty. So, there is not a clear definition that is applicable for every single person since every person in poverty has their own story.

Another thing that is instantly perceive with poverty is ethnicity. When the word poverty is mentioned,  "the image that most likely comes to mind is one of young black men caught up in a swirl of drugs and violence and irresponsible single women having babies."  But too much social media, internet, movies, and videos portray this causing this to be very stereotypical. In reality, "Many whites live side by side African-Americans in some of the country's poorest urban neighborhoods." In fact, it is statistically proven that there are more whites on food stamps than blacks or minorities. So, just by having a hazing perception of this word is another reason why solutions can not be made since a person can not generate a solution if they do not even realize that there is a problem. This mainly happens since "White poverty is less expected, less recognized and less studied, we often exclude poor whites from our discussions." This huge misunderstanding definitely prevents some people in urban poverty from ameliorating their living condition if not all audiences are being reached.

However, I instantly got to show respect for those that are trying to make this problem come to a dissolution. For example, there is a program called Foundation's Urban Poverty Special Initiative. There motto is, "we believe there is an opportunity for city governments and the urban poor to work together to find solutions that will address their common problems,” So, of course there are people trying their best to mollify the rate of urban poverty. But it is not everyone's fault... Some people just simply do not have money to contribute to the poor due to the fact they need to focus on themselves. But one thing that does not requires money is learning. Learning is free. You can learn in a class, online, or even friends and family. So, just simply knowing more about this topic will easily help these people escape poverty.

As the final conclusion of this blog, I want to say thank you for engaging with my blog. In order for all of us to succeed at ending urban poverty or at least attempt at it, is to become more aware and learn more about the issue at hand. This issue might be something that our generation might not be able to see become resolved since it is so complex, but if we all learn more, then we will see results.