The term juvenilization of poverty is one used to describe the processes by which children are at a higher risk for being poor, suffer consistent and long-term negative effects due to deprivation (physical, mental, and psychological), and are disproportionately affected by systemic issues that perpetuate poverty. The term connotes not just the mere existence of child poverty but the increase in both relative and absolute measures of poverty among children as compared to both other vulnerable groups and the population at large.
Academic study of the juvenilization of poverty attempts to explain the methodical ways in which children are systematically disenfranchised by institutions, government welfare spending, and opportunities for health and wellness. Research also connects the juvenilization of poverty to overall trends in family structures, parental work, and economic supports for children and families. In particular, the juvenilization of poverty is closely linked to the "feminization of poverty", or the ways in which women worldwide are also disproportionately affected by poverty. Both terms – "juvenilization" and "feminization" – have been contested in political and academic discourse.
History of the term In the 1980s scholars and practitioners in the fields of public administration, sociology, and social work began noting a distressingly rapid rise in rates of juvenile poverty. This, after several decades of falling child poverty rates, with a low of about 15% in 1974, signaled to many a possible reversal in the gains made during the 1960s and 1970s for children's wellness.
A central aspect of concern was that juvenile poverty was rising in two-parent and single-parent mother homes, contrary to the perceived inherent stability of two-parent families. A 1989 article by Mary Jo Bane and David Ellwood linked changes in the labor market and declining male wages to rising child poverty trends, leading to further investigations of the connections between work, family structures, social services spending, and childhood welfare.
Also notable regarding the rise in juvenile poverty was the concurrent decrease in the rates of poverty among other vulnerable or "dependent" populations, specifically the elderly. In 1984 demographer Samuel Preston reported on several statistics that should have counter-indicated these trends. First a "sharp fertility decline" in the two decades after the 1957 postwar peak, matched with "a very rapid decline in old age mortality", should have indicated "favorable consequences for children and troubling ones for the elderly. In fact, he writes,
My thesis is that exactly the opposite trends have occurred in the relative well being of our two groups of age dependents and that demographic factors have not only failed to prevent this outcome but have, in many ways, encouraged it. Conditions have deteriorated for children and improved dramatically for the elderly...
Considering these shifts and anomalous patterns of prosperity, the term "juvenilization of poverty" was coined to give name to the growing understanding the poverty was being increasingly and systematically born by children. The term, in both scholarship and practice, is used to elucidate ways in which children, even in times of economic gains and despite evidence seemingly to the contrary, are at a disproportionate risk of living in poverty.
Trends in child poverty up to 2010 Child poverty in the United States has fluctuated dramatically over time, usually in response to large-scale economic and political events. Estimates of juvenile poverty during the Great Depression judge that as many as 7 in 10 children, or 70% of all Americans under the age of 18, lived in poverty. The economic recovery afforded by World War II and post-war prosperity dramatically reduced both the number and percent of children living in impoverished homes.
Until the early 1960s however, no official, formalized national attempt was made to measure a standard poverty rate. In 1963, however, analyst Mollie Orshansky, a Social Security Administration researcher, worked to develop an official poverty threshold to standardize poverty measures.
Still used today, the Orshansky Poverty Threshold is an absolute measure of poverty that uses as its basis a "minimally adequate food budget" for families of varying sizes, estimating that food costs required approximately one-third of a family's after-tax budget. Thus a family (of three or more) fell below the poverty threshold if their after-tax income is less than three times the "minimally adequate food budget". Despite some changes to the formula, this measure remains at the center of the official measures of absolute poverty.
Orshansky's calculations determined that in 1960 just under 30% of children lived in poverty. This rate continued to decline throughout the 1960s and 1970s due to a combination of economic growth, strong social welfare spending, and a robust labor market that increasingly included working mothers. Overall rates of child poverty reached a low in 1974 at, according to varying estimates, between 8-15%. However, in the last third of the 20th century child poverty rates among single parent (usually only a mother) and two-parent families began to surge.
This generally positive history of child poverty in the first two thirds of the 20th century belies, however, the variability of poverty rates for different subpopulations of children. Juvenile poverty varied both geographically and by racial subgroups. Despite overall gains, children of color were far more likely than White children to live in poverty. Certain regions, especially the south and some urban centers, also experienced high rates of concentrated poverty.
Many of the causes for the juvenilization of poverty follow highly racialized affect patterns, meaning children of color are far more likely to suffer from poverty, both in the United States and internationally. Suzanne Bianchi finds that "between 1960 and 1991, the proportion of children living in mother-only families increased from 8 percent to 26 percent. The rise among black children living in mother-only families was much more pronounced than for white children. By 1991, 54 percent of black compared with 17 percent of white children lived only with their mother" (Bianchi 1991).
According to the most recent statistics from the National Center for Children in Poverty (NCCP) at Columbia University, about 51 million children, or 21% of the juvenile population of the United States, live "in families with incomes below the federal poverty level – $22,050 a year for a family of four".Federal Poverty Guidelines: http://www.nccp.org/publications/images/mip08_fig1.jpg
The United States is one of the only nations that uses an absolute measure to determine poverty rates. In Europe and elsewhere best practices indicate that a relative measure of poverty is the best indicator of both proportional deprivation and comparable quality of life. Using a relative measure of poverty is considered a more accurate way of determining the economic stability of a group relative to both the general population and other comparable subpopulations. Using a relative measure to determine juvenile poverty rates requires setting a cutoff point – 60%, 50%, or 40% are standard measures – of average income, at which point a child or family is classified as poor. Relative measures of child poverty show that an even higher percentage of children in the US are impoverished, deepening the juvenilization of poverty.
The NCCP also writes that "Research shows, on average, families need an income of about twice that level to cover basic expenses. Using this standard, 42% of children live in low-income families".
According to the most recent statistics from the National Center for Children in Poverty (NCCP) at Columbia University, about 51 million children, or 21% of the juvenile population of the United States, live "in families with incomes below the federal poverty level – $22,050 a year for a family of four".
Using these calculations, the number of children currently living in poverty in the United States is between 1:5 and 2:5 children. A recent analysis of the 2010 US Census found that the number of poor children rose by 1 million in 2010, with nearly 1:5 American children now living in poverty. Either statistic, say advocates of child welfare, is far too high. They point to histories of the past 50 years and especially the past 20 years and make the claim that even in good economic eras and especially in bad ones, the effects of poverty have been disproportionately transferred to children.
Controversies However, there is also a body of scholarship in response that questions the validity of these terms, finding that there has been neither an increase in women/child poverty nor a systematic project to transfer poverty to these populations. In particular, conservative researchers have argued that mismeasurement, inaccurate calculations, and inherent flaws in poverty data collection have overstated both child poverty rates and the juvenilization of poverty. Susan Mayer and Christopher Jencks write: After a century of fairly steady decline, the official poverty rate among American children increased from 14.0 percent in 1969 to 19.6 percent in 1989, suggesting that the United States was losing its war on poverty. But once we correct various defects in the official poverty measure, our best estimate is that the proportion of children in households with incomes below the poverty line probably fell between 1969 and 1989 or between 1967 and 1991.
These scholars point instead to changes in family structures that have economic implications and welfare spending that attempts to ameliorate or offset poverty's effects. They cite increase access to medical care, improved living conditions, and higher percentages of children living in lower-crime areas as evidence that juvenile poverty is actually easing, rather than increasing.
Causes of child poverty The theory of a "juvenilization of poverty" rests on a notion that juvenile poverty is not just (too) high but increasing. Several categories of trends are cited as responsible for the systematic increase in juvenile poverty.
Changes in family structures Social scientists frequently point to changes in family structure as one of the primary forces driving juvenile poverty. Of particular note are the increasing number of children living in unmarried or single-mother households. This factor is one of the reasons why the juvenilization of poverty is so closely linked to discussions of female poverty.
The rapid changes in family structure that began to occur in the 1960s and throughout the latter half of the 20th century had dramatic impacts on the financial realities of many women and children. During World War II and the decades succeeding it, many more women entered the workforce, divorce rates increased rapidly, and birth rates decreased. These shifts were both reactions to and reflections of massive shifts in the American economic, social, and cultural landscapes.
Studies show that single-parent households are far more likely to subsist below the poverty line. Some estimates say that children living in single parents homes are as much as four times as likely to live in poverty. Single parents must often support children on only one salary and must do so without the logistical and emotional support of another adult. Even when absent parents (in most cases, fathers) do pay child support, that income is less than what it would be if the parent was living with the family. As cases of single parent families rise, without commensurate increases in social welfare spending it is clearly predictable that more children will live in poverty.