The students at UW-Madison are incredibly aware of a wide variety of social issues facing our country today, and their efforts often result in change for the better. However, many students on campus are oblivious to ""The Other America,"" or the millions of families nationwide living in poverty.
This lack of awareness is not just a problem on our campus, though. Instead, it is symptomatic of a national way of thinking.
We as a nation are conditioned to believe the United States is ""America the Great"" and ""The Greatest Country in the World."" We have been taught the rags-to-riches story and, perhaps, we ignore poverty because it is incompatible with these myths.
However, the poverty statistics for the so-called ""Greatest Country on Earth"" are staggering. According to a 2005 Newsweek article, 12.7 percent of the population lives in poverty, which is ""the highest in the developed world and more than twice as high as in most other industrialized countries.""
Furthermore, an estimated seven million of these impoverished people and 20 percent of homeless people work full time. The number of Americans lacking health insurance is appalling, at about 16 percent, and the federal minimum wage of $5.15 an hour would be laughable if it wasn't so tragic.
These facts should dash away any ideas we still hold about being the greatest country on Earth. However, some people still believe anyone can rise from rags to riches, and they blame the poor for not raising themselves up.
But those of us born into privilege often don't realize how hard it is to break the cycle of poverty. Many people who attend college had parents who also did so and put them on that path from an early age. In impoverished families, the parents most likely did not receive a higher education, and therefore do not steer their children in the same direction. Moreover, even if impoverished children wanted to attend college, their local schools would leave them unprepared, as money and resources fall short.
Poverty without hope is unacceptable. Many other developed countries have national health care, and basic health care should be a right in the United States, not a privilege. We as citizens need to open our eyes to this situation—we need to get angry about it.
Wisconsin is not free from this issue, either. According to the Institute for Research on Poverty's website, 9 percent of Wisconsinites are living below the poverty level, as were 15 percent of Madison residents in 1999.
As the generation set to call the shots in a decade or two, we on campus must open our eyes to this tragic, often ignored demographic, starting at the local level. Poverty is a key issue in the mayoral race, and we should vote for the candidate who will best address it. We should also pay attention to how well Gov. Jim Doyle's health-care initiatives, such as BadgerCare Plus and SeniorCare, pan out.
Finally, we need to put pressure on our representatives to raise the minimum wage, lower the cost of drugs and improve low-income area schools. They need to know they will not get elected if they continue to ignore the conditions of a large number of citizens.
We want to graduate from UW-Madison into a state and country we are proud to live in—proud to call ""America the Great."" Making sure every citizen is given an equal chance in life will help build the nation we envision.
