Cody Johnson and David Koontz
PDP
Ms. Duncan
12/3/12
Individual Choices and Paths Affecting Poverty
There are many important decisions in someone’s life that can affect their
happiness, and their lifestyle in general. From the time someone starts school at a young
age, to the time he or she gets a job, people are making decisions that will affect the way
they are going to live the rest of their life. The decisions can vary from whether or not
someone strives to achieve academic excellence, to whether or not they have the drive to
get a job and work hard at that job. It is inevitable that people have to make individual
choices and decisions, and without the right choices someone could run the risk of living
in poverty. When someone is already living in poverty, poor choices could lead to a life
that is even worse off than that person could be living prior to those decisions.
The question that is provoked by this is, “Do individual choices and paths either
cause or worsen the state of poverty someone is already in?” This question can be
approached by many different angles, and there is a lot of research that proves poverty is
affected by an individual’s choices. Without making decisions, people would be living a
life determined by someone else. There are only a few situations where someone would
have to live a life that is determined by someone else, and that usually happens in
different countries than the U.S. Therefore, even though certain situations and
environments can influence decisions, it is still the individual that determines the life path
they want to take.
In a more specific field of individual decision making, many people think that the
education level someone attains affects whether that person lives in poverty or not.
Generally, the higher level of education someone reaches, then the higher wages they are
going to earn. The U.S. Census Bureau calculated an average of the annual income from
2004 for someone with no high school diploma and the income for someone with a
bachelor’s degree. The average for someone with no high school diploma was $19,169,
and the average for someone with a bachelor’s degree was $51,554 (U.S. Census
Bureau). These statistics come from a very credible source, therefore, it is clear that the
level of education someone reaches definitely affects the annual income they are going to
earn.
The reason someone would not receive a high school diploma is because it is not
hard for students to drop out of high school. When someone makes the decision to drop
out of high school, they are making a personal choice to typically make less money than
they would have if they received a diploma or a college degree. An article stated that
seven in ten dropouts live in poverty in New York, and in Chicago forty percent of
dropouts live in poverty (Malanga). It is up to an individual to strive for exceptional
grades in high school, and eventually graduate. It seems like in today’s economy it is
basically essential to receive some type of degree in order to live a life that most people
would consider happy. It was stated in an article that in “today’s economy obtaining a
postsecondary degree could make the difference between a lifetime of poverty and a
secure economic future (Spotlight on Poverty).” Based off the numbers above, parents
should be doing nothing but encouraging their children to attain an advanced level of
education.
The problem is that children in certain situations do not have the positive
influences that are necessary to reach the highest level of education possible. If a child is
brought up in household that does not have much money, then it is very difficult for the
family to send their child to college to receive a degree. In a situation such as this one, it
is not up to the child to determine if he or she goes to college. Even in a predicament like
this, a child can still work as hard as possible in high school because the average income
increases by around $10,000 when comparing a high school diploma to no diploma at all
(U.S. Census Bureau). Considering the fact there are many children that are raised in
households that are in the poverty class, they are already at a disadvantage when it comes
to reaching the highest level of education possible.
There is still a chance for children that are raised in households that are poor,
because as long as these children obtain sufficient grades in school then they would be
eligible for financial help when it comes time to go to college. Therefore, if someone is
absolutely determined to go to college and get a degree in something they desire to do,
then it is up to that person to make the decision to get a post-grad degree. It is easier said
than done, because for someone that does nothing but take out loans and receive financial
help for college then it is going to take some time to pay those loans off after college.
Financial aid is very important, because it gives someone that is raised in a poor family
the opportunity to continue their education and not settle for an unfulfilled lifestyle.
Even though it is up to an individual to make their life turn out the way they want,
there are still many factors that contribute to the failure of someone’s academic career.
The environment someone is raised in can affect the motivation of a child drastically. If a
child’s parents and family do not support the success of a child in school, then that child
will be less likely to have determination in school. The main thing a child looks for is
support and encouragement from their parents, and when a family is living in poverty it is
hard to be happy for someone. It was stated in an article that poverty adds extensive
stress to the family, which can make the parents overlook the success their child is having
(Driscoll). It is not the child’s fault that the family is living in poverty; therefore, the
parents should have more respect for what the child is accomplishing in school. When a
child is discouraged about school, then they are obviously going to be more inclined to
drop out. This is a case where someone would make a life decision, but that decision
would be influenced by other people.
Not only can the parents not be supportive, but also teachers in neighborhoods
that have a large amount of poor households tend to not be as highly qualified as teachers
in wealthy areas. When a teacher is not as qualified as they should be, then the students
are not going to gain the necessary skills to reach another level of education. The reason a
child living in a poverty stricken area would have less qualified teachers would be,
because the schools simply have a lower budget to pay teachers than the schools in
wealthy areas do. Also, teachers that feel they are very qualified would probably be less
inclined to teach at a school in an area filled with poverty (Sawchuk). Therefore, the
teachers they are taught by can affect the education and resources a student obtains,
which is yet another factor they cannot control but can lead to them not continuing their
academic career.
In relation to family and drop out rates, divorce could be another situation that
causes children raised in a poor family to have increased risks of dropping out of school.
The reason for this is because almost fifty percent of parents that go through divorce
move into poverty after the divorce (Fagan). This affects children not only because their
parents move below the poverty line, but also because children of divorced parents
perform more poorly in reading, spelling, and math (Fagan). When children are
performing poorly in critical areas, then they will most likely be more inclined to give up
and ultimately drop out of school before they graduate.
Another factor that has been proven to lead students to drop out of school is the
neighborhood they are raised in. It may seem as a sort of stereotype, but studies have
shown that children that attend schools in the inner city are more likely to drop out. In
schools that receive little funding, about seventy percent of the students are below the
poverty line; and the schools in these neighborhoods have less funding because the
school budgets are tied to property taxes (“11 Facts”). This shows that students are
limited to the amount of resources available, simply because of the neighborhood they
live in. This is correlated with drop out rates, because graduation rates are fifteen percent
lower in urban schools than suburban schools (“11 Facts”). Lastly, in this same article it
was stated that children raised in poor families are six times more likely to drop out than
children raised in wealthy families (“11 Facts”). A child cannot determine the
neighborhood they are raised in, so that is another factor that influences the personal
decisions someone makes when it comes to the education level they reach.
One very important factor that can keep a child from attaining a high level of
education is when children that are born into poor families have to help out around the
house. This could consist of working to help add additional income to the household. It
would definitely keep someone from getting a good education if they have to work in
order to help their family survive. This could be a life path that can definitely keep
someone from reaching their full academic potential, as their priorities are elsewhere.
Does the individual failings, such as drug abuse and laziness, help cause poverty,
or is it the government’s fault that a lot of lazy poor folks are depending on welfare
checks or food stamps? I believe that it isn’t only the people’s fault, but it also lies under
the government’s fault too. Bruce Western mentioned in a Nation article, “Drugs are
intensively criminalized among the poor but largely unregulated among the rich”
(Western 12). This is mainly because of the factors that the poor have to exert
themselves.
They are being forced to exert themselves to these bad neighborhoods, which have a
big effect on how their viewpoint on drug use is. As Western said, “In the absence of any
serious effort to improve economic opportunity, particularly among young men with little
schooling, drug control has become our surrogate social policy” (Western 12). This
mainly means that they aren’t trying to really fix the economy, but drug control is rising
to a much bigger problem for us, because they are trying to put “bad men” behind bars. “I
also found that 35% of Black males are in jail, because of the use of drugs, such as
drinking, marijuana, non-injection crack users, heroin, and cocaine” (Western 12). This is
a typical stereotype for the courts, because over all the black men trialed, the majority of
them are locked up, just because they are Black. “Also, according to the National Survey
on Drug Use and Health, about 9 percent of Americans are addicted to drugs and/or
alcohol, and less than a quarter of these receive substance abuse treatment” (Velaquez
14). Drug use is a big problem in America; because the poor are spending a lot of their
welfare check money on drugs to overcome their problems. “Another study estimates that
37 percent of those who do are referred by the criminal justice system. Because of the
lack of accessible, community-based resources, many people gain access to the treatment
they need only after being arrested” (Velaquez 14). This is sad, because just of the simple
fact, that the country really is trying to help drug users that much, they rather just put the
man behind bars, and don’t have to worry about them, which makes this country really
corrupt.
The rates on Drug use in the big city, is slowly increasing each year, because they
don’t know how to overcome their problems in poverty. “A study in Washington, DC
shows that 50% of males that are in poverty have used marijuana or some type of drug
throughout their life” (Kuo, et al., 2011), which is really sad because the use of drugs
have multiplied since the 20th century passing. I believe that the country is going to fall
apart if they do not find a way to help the poor, but to prevent them from using it on
unnecessary drugs. “The stated aim of the policy is to reduce the consumption of drugs of
abuse through the arrest and imprisonment of drug dealers and, to a lesser extent, the
detention of drug users” (Western 12). This reluctantly means they are going to try to
prevent drugs by instead of arresting the buyer; they are going to arrest and imprisonment
of drug dealers to lessen the effect of drugs on the poor. I believe this policy isn’t the
smartest way to go about the problem we are suffering, as they keep putting it off. All
they have to do is pretty much, do a study and watch over what the people on welfare
spend their money on, which would probably be smart, because if you see a majority of
the money going to drug dealers, then the country isn’t really taking a step, or getting
anywhere with the factor of drugs. I believe that most people that use drugs are only
doing it to put off their future problems, such as schooling and paying bills. The only way
to help this problem is to try and get the attention of the poor by giving them more of a
chance to get a good paying job. The poor will not go and work for a minimum paying
job, because all they have to do is watch television all day and still end up getting more
money than most Americans working for their money now-a-days.
Is drug use the problem with poverty, or is it just really poor laziness that is
affecting our country? “Recent studies show that families that left welfare recently (2000
or later) are less likely to be working than families that left welfare in the 1990s. A recent
Urban Institute report shows that the proportion of families that leave welfare and are not
employed rose from 50 percent in 1999 to 58 percent in 2002” (Fremstad, 2004). As the
country is trying to overcome the depression that we dug ourselves into, the poor are
living off of welfare, and the unemployment rate is still rising each year, which is really
bad, because by time we get out of college and attempt to find a good paying job. There
is going to be a really small amount of jobs out there for us. “The overall unemployment
rate of low-income single mothers increased from 9.8 percent in 2000 to 12.3 percent in
2002. After decreasing at a faster rate than the unemployment rate for the overall
population in the last half of the 1990s, low-income single mothers’ unemployment rate
increased at a faster rate between 2000 and 2002 than the national unemployment rate”
(Chapman and Bernstein, 2003). This is almost a 3 percent jump in the unemployment
rate for single mothers in only two years, if they do not start to create more jobs, then we
are going to have a serious problem. By time, the government actually does their job; the
poor are going to be struggling through these harsh times. The government should be
creating more jobs, but instead they are trying to crack down on drug dealer and
criminals, which shows how corrupt the country is. A quote from Get Rich or Die Trying,
which is a documentary, not a fictional movie, says, “A drug dealer’s busiest day is when
the welfare checks come out” (Jackson, 2005). This means that when the welfare checks
come out that the poor tend to use some of their welfare checks on drugs. I believe that
this is should be cut down on by the government, which could happen if they actually
paid any attention to the poor on welfare. Hard working Americans are working their butt
off to pay their rent, when the poor do not have to even wake up in the morning for work.
I also believe that you should not be able to be on welfare for more than three months at a
time, so it prevents people from cheating the “system”.
I think that is also another factor to poverty, not only are the poor losing their
jobs, but the government has failed to create more jobs, which isn’t the smartest thing. If
you think about it, the government could make a lot of money off of taxing us, but they
still fail to see that the country cannot prosper without new jobs. The government’s
failure to create jobs and the cost of living might be the biggest two issues for poverty
though. “The president’s energy policy tends to drive up gas prices, not lower them. His
proposed five-year offshore drilling plan excludes Virginia. His opposition to the XL
pipeline continues to press up gas prices. In addition, the pipeline would pump some 20
billion dollars into our private economy and create well over 20,000 private, not
government, jobs” (Hevener, 2012). This means that Obama is trying to create 20,000
more private jobs for business, but this doesn’t kick in for another few years, which isn’t
really any help with the country right now. I found that a study shows the unemployment
rate in Nevada is 11.1%, which is the highest unemployment rate currently in the United
States now. The second highest is California, which is currently at 10.1% unemployment
rate. This is entirely understandable though, because the gas prices and cost of living in
California is unbelievable now a day. The gas prices in California are going to hit six
dollars a gallon at the rates it is going, but this will be really unbelievable to think.
Whether it comes down to education or a personal decision someone makes that is
unnecessary, there are countless choices people make that determine their lifestyle. When
it comes to education, everyone has a choice to push his or herself through school and go
on to bigger things than a high school diploma or no diploma at all. Also, when it comes
to spending money on certain things an individual does not need in order to live, which
could be considered a bad life decision. If it were not for poor decisions, then there would
be more people that are better off financially. Poor decisions could not only cause
poverty to be worsened in a household, but it could flat out cause someone to move into
poverty.
The fact that people encounter life decisions everyday is unavoidable, but it is
whether or not each person makes the most of that decision that determines the life they
will live. It all comes down to whether or not people can make the right choices and
decisions to fulfill the lifestyle they want for themselves and in some situations their
family. The life decisions and choices we make can start earlier than people even realize,
and even tougher decisions approach us, as we get older. The wrong and right decisions
we make can clearly affect the financial state we live in for the rest of our life. Even
though many of the decisions people make can be influenced by outside sources, it still
comes down to the motives that a certain individual has and the life that each person
desires to live.
References
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<http://www.spotlightonpoverty.org/education_and_poverty.asp&xgt;.
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