Effects of poverty free essay sample

The Effects Of Poverty , WRIT 300 October 15, 2012 Poverty is an enigma that seems to plague each corner of the United States. No matter how rich how stabilize or how strong our country may claim it is poverty lurks in shadow of all places on this earth and in it’s silhouette the opprobrious effects. The three scholarly articles I summarized connect the dots on how poverty impacts the United States economically; and socially. The first articles I summarized Haiyun Zhao, Zhilan Feng, Carlos Castillo-havez, (2008) conducted an study that examines the effects that poverty has on our society economically, and the effects it has on children growing up in poor areas. Zhao, Feng, Havez, (2008) starts out by shedding light on the financial and social burden poverty is to the United States. Zhao, Feng, Havez, (2008) states that poverty cost about 4% a year of the GDP. In their attempt to estimate the cost of poverty in America Zhao, Feng, Havez, (2008) perform a study on children in poverty stricken areas. The study looks at how the children behave, while living in the areas and how it plays out in their actions as adults. Subsequently, leading to the determination of rather there is a correlation between poverty and the economy. Zhao, Feng, Havez, (2008) go into another study that displays statistical correlations between how the difference of environment, meaning poor class or rich class contributed to large disparities in test scores, along with differences in physical aggression between the children from both classes. From this Zhao, Feng, Havez, (2008) conclude that those who score poor are more likely to becoming adolescent parents, become unemployed and become criminals. Moving on, Zhao, Feng, Havez, (2008) begin the next section by saying a family economic status greatly effects the quality of school the child attends, the emotional well being of child, parenting the child receives, and resources the child has access, which all affect actions that the child makes as an adult. For instance, Zhao, Feng, Havez, (2008) continue their article by breaking down how they estimate the actual cost; they say that the earning loss associated with poverty can be counted as an output loss for the United States economy. The following section focuses on loss earnings, childhood poverty impacts, adult crime and poor health. For example, Zhao, Feng, Havez, (2008) state that the low test scores and poor education is in the category as loss earnings. Concluding this part of the article Zhao, Feng, Havez, (2008) say that there is still debate on whether or not household income has an impact on the United States, but that children growing up in poverty stricken areas have to deal with certain factors like school, productivity, behavior, individual skills and overall outcomes these children have to face in life. Switching topics, this part of the article focuses on the cost of childhood poverty, crime and poor health. It is broken down into two sections, the first being childhood poverty’s impacts on crime and health among adults. Sections begin with the fact that children living in poverty are 1. 3 times more likely to be involved in serious criminal offenses compared to children not maintaining a space in poverty stricken areas. Zhao, Feng, Havez, (2008) back up this statement by citing a well know sociologist Cohen. Thus, who performed a study that demonstrated the more likelihood of a violent crime being committed by someone living in poor conditions, Cohen concludes that 20 percent of crime occurs due to poverty. From there they go on to state what the annual cost of crime associated with poverty is estimated to be which comes out to be roughly 2 trillion a year and 1. 3 that is derived from street crime. Zhao, Feng, Havez, (2008) finish the section by showing startling facts that poverty cost the United States 700 billion a year and that this figure is most likely under the real cost of poverty. The second part of their last section puts emphasis on childhood poverty health and how it also affects the economy. Zhao, Feng, Havez, (2008) finds a study that proves poverty raises the health care bill by 22 billion a year. For this reason, they combine this finding with the others such as foregone earnings, crime, and health which concluded that people living in poverty cost America an astonishing 38 percent of the GDP. Zhao, Feng, Havez, (2008) ends their research by stating that the estimations of poverties effects and cost are understated and most likely are more severe and costly. This article brought up important points and backed them up with facts; however I do think they could have done a better job on breaking down the cost structure, for the 700 billion figure given. The work done by Zhao, Feng, Havez (2008) detailed some of the effects of poverty. However, there should have been more emphasis on the social impacts of poverty. This is where Mulia and Zemore (2012) excel at. Mulia and Zemore (2012) reviewed and discussed social adversity; drugs and how it impacts people living in poor areas. Mulia and Zemore (2012) talks about how people living in low income areas are affected by more situations, oppose to others in high income areas. In particular, Mulia and Zemore (2012) lean towards the theory of social strain, which points to poverty being the reason for drug abuse among other crimes. Comparing Mulia and Zemore (2012) work to Zhao, Feng, Havez, (2008) the article picks up the improves where the previous lacked at by providing a theory that supports their study, of overall affects of poverty. The theory states that the strain of being in poverty produces more social hurdles in the path of the inhabitants, which in turn makes them more susceptible to drug abuse and criminality. Some problems Mulia and Zemore (2012) focus on were Alcoholisms and how because of poverty the people are more likely to overindulge, oppose to people living above the Federal poverty line. In a study done by Mulia and Zemore (2012) they found that 48% percent of people living below federal poverty limit suffer from alcohol dependence, oppose to middle class or those above the poverty limit. In addition, Mulia and Zemore (2012) state that the results display the difference of alcoholism between the two classes exposes the effect namely, stress from poverty that brings the residents to drug abuse. It concludes by stating people of poor financial class are more vulnerable to drug dependency, such as alcoholism as an result of being exposed to poverty and having to maneuver pass more adversities. The last article by Yoshikawa, Aber, Beardslee, (2012) compliments the work done by both previous articles, while illumining new angles to examine the effects of poverty. Yoshikawa, Aber, Beardslee, (2012) zero in on how poverty can affect the mental, behavioral health and emotional health of youths. Yoshikawa, Aber, Beardslee, (2012) talks about all the different dynamics of how poverty affects each one of these categories. Yoshikawa, Aber, Beardslee, (2012) begin by defining what poverty is and how they are going measure the effects of poverty in context to the emotional, mental, and behavioral health. Hence, they further their research by, explaining the dynamics of the selection process of becoming poor and how it directly relates to the children. As a result, Yoshikawa, Aber, Beardslee, (2012) incorporate facts on how the family living in poor areas can affect the child emotional, mental, and behavior state. In comparison, poverty being an major impact on children’s emotional, mental, and behavior state cosigns the work done Zhao, Feng, Havez, (2008) in the context of how children’s cognitive abilities was affected depending on weather they lived in poverty stricken areas, or in a higher social class. Yoshikawa, Aber, Beardslee, (2012) delve a little deeper with the study mainly talking about how understanding the effects of poverty is key to coming up with prevention tactics to combat poverty. Ending their study, Yoshikawa, Aber, Beardslee, (2012) explains in great detail how poverty occurs as well as effects then makes solutions to alleviate poverty. In conclusion, I found that all the articles presented in this paper were very relevant when trying to explain the effects of poverty. For example, Zhao, Feng, Havez, (2008) start out by breaking down the effects of poverty on the economy, from their Zhao, Feng, Havez, (2008) move to the effects it has on children growing up in poor areas. The article that followed done by Mulia and Zemore (2012) combo’s with the first article by picking up where Zhao, Feng, Havez, (2008) lacked at. For instance, talking more in-depth about the social adversities that poverty leads to and how it makes people living in poor condition more open to drug abuse. The last article weaves everything together by extending the talk of how poverty affects children as well as the households they live in. In sum, all three articles showed great details in there reviews, as well as building off each other in areas hit and missed. Furthermore the articles all accomplished their goals, which was to explain the many effects of poverty. References â€Å"Haiyun Zhao, Zhilan Feng, Carlos Castillo-havez, (2008), The Dynamics Of Poverty and Crime, 225-235† â€Å"Mulia, N. , Zemore, S. E. (2012). Social Adversity, Stress, and Alcohol Problems: Are Racial/Ethnic Minorities and the Poor More Vulnerable?. Journal Of Studies On Alcohol Drugs, 73(4), 570-580. † â€Å"Yoshikawa, H. , Aber, J. , Beardslee, W. R. (2012). The Effects of Poverty on the Mental, Emotional, and Behavioral Health of Children and Youth. American Psychologist, 67(4), 272-284. doi:10. 1037/a0028015†