50th anniversary of War on Poverty! NPR

It's the 50th Anniversary of LBJ's War on Poverty.
So NPR did some 50th anniversary let's look at poverty now episodes...


1. One Family's Story Shows How The Cycle of Poverty is Hard to Break

This video explains what has happened to a single mother in her life of poverty. It's a sad personal story that shows how relentless poverty is. It feels very GPP 115—she can't get out of poverty because she has so many problems, and all of the institutions around her are working against her.





2. The Changing Picture Of Poverty: Hard Work Is 'Just Not Enough'

This clip is more GPP 105, changing how we think about poverty...they talk about poverty as no longer just being a problem of resources. Poverty looks different today than it did 50 years ago. Poor people have gadgets, some resources, etc. but in addition to still lacking resources, support networks used to be a lot stronger. Folks could depend on their families, on their neighbors, etc. at least for emotional support.

This is also meant for people who probably haven't read Katz, so it does provide listeners with some of that vocabulary of qualifying poverty in different ways.

3. Struggling to Get Out Of Poverty: The 'Two Generation' Approach

This explains a story of trying to tackle poverty through educating single moms. It seems like this program is doing good work, but within the context of the other shows, how much good could they really be doing? How much change can they really affect?


Global Poverty has changed the way I feel about mainstream information on poverty. I mean NPR is pretty good, they rarely blame people, but I am still looking for deeper meaning. To what degree are they trying to explain and qualify poverty. How are they asking people these questions? Why aren't they studying up as a part of these shows?
Studying up recently popped into my head as a part of how Wolf of Wall Street was.
First off, I seriously hated that movie. However, I do believe that they were trying to make mainstream the extravagance, irresponsibility, and grotesqueness of the 1% on Wall Street. However, I still hated it because I feel like they made a spectacle of women's bodies and made it all look fun, not giving enough umph to the this sucks lets shut down wall street side of it. That movie needed a bit more studying "down".
Anyway... sorry for the tangent... enjoy the podcasts!