War on Poverty

The article, “A Global Perspective on America's ‘War on Poverty’ “ by Anne Goddard and Olu Johnson  discusses early on that we can never truly "win the war on poverty" because we do not know what that victory actually looks like. The article points out that obviously the numbers show great progress, especially in senior citizens but that does not by any means we have won the war on poverty. For example, "16.7 million children live in what the government terms 'food insecure' households, according to Olu Johnson of United Way. The number of people living in poverty, in the world however has dropped 80 percent since 1976 according to The National Bureau of Economic Research. Johnson also explains that “there are a number of factors that have contributed to this upward movement. To start, the global economy has improved generally over time, giving developed nations a greater capacity and willingness to commit official development assistance. Historically, external private investment also runs higher during periods of prosperity. And developing countries themselves have been able to leverage the benefits of a strong global economy to raise living standards internally.” These factors are based heavily on how developed a country is and how willing its citizens are to participate in fixing the issue.