Independence Day

Last night I sat with my family around the table, already hearing sounds of firecrackers.  The conversation wound its way to focus on who lives here, in the United States, and in what conditions.  My daughter pointed out that there is a huge immigrant population, and many are living in poverty. Both my son and daughter went on to talk about poverty, in the United States and in the world, with the statistic that 80% of people in the world are living on $10 or less each day, many on less than $2 a day. There is significant poverty in this country, generally not to that level, largely because of minimum wage laws for people who are able to find jobs.  However, in this country, homelessness is increasing.  We went on to talk about different levels of poverty, and that in this country, most people do have sanitation and clean water, whereas that is an enormous problem in other parts of the world, making a big difference in complications of illness and death.  Per UNICEF, 22,000 children die every day because of poverty.