Data suggests that 1 in 5 American young adults, ages 18-34, are living in poverty. We’re looking for stories about the experiences of these millennials.
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Recently, I have been reading The American Way of Poverty: How The Other Half Still Lives by Sasha Abramsky. A specific passage caught my attention:
In part, America’s poverty epidemic is a failure of imagination–we haven’t invested enough energy into understanding the causes and manifestations of poverty in today’s United States, or into imagining alternatives. In part, though, it’s a failure of empathy–we haven’t as a society worked out why we should care.
With census information dating from 1980 to today, trends show that young adult poverty is on the rise. It is predicted that at least 1 in 5 millennials live in poverty. If we are to understand the causes, imagine alternatives, and empathize with these individuals, we must also be willing to hear their stories.
The Guyhood section of the Good Men Project is seeking submissions from young adults who:
- currently live in poverty
- have risen from poverty
- are on the front lines of advocacy (minimum wage; structural inequality; etc.)
- imagine alternatives to our societal structure that allows these levels of poverty
This is not a restrictive list. Other ideas are certainly welcome.
Please e-mail proposals, drafts, or fully edited works to [email protected].
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Image credit: Steven Pisano/flickr
Stopping sending the jobs overseas, restore funding to education especially vocational training, make college and vocational education free, give the people the right to join unions, put curbs on companies’ ability to bust up unions or prevent unions from being form, curb wealthy people and corporations from deciding how the economy should be run, curb CEO’s pay, re-erect trade barriers to protect American industries, raise the minimum wage to 30 or 50 hours an hour (if you can pay CEOs all that money, stock options, and bonuses, then you should be able to afford to pay people a minimum wage… Read more »