The costs of poverty are not only high, but they’re often hidden from the larger public, something the Washington Post tried to tackle in a lengthy feature earlier this week:

The poorer you are, the more things cost. More in money, time, hassle, exhaustion, menace … The poor know these facts of life. These facts become their lives.

The benefits of everyone, not just the poor, knowing these facts, is twofold. First, it pushes back against false stereotypes about the poor (that they are lazy or have bad habits or make bad choices). Second, it lets us think strategically about ways to improve conditions and make things better.  In this vein, Ed Sector’s Erin Dillon has a new report detailing how to create “functioning, well-designed markets” that “improve higher-quality supply and higher-quality demand.” In the report’s introduction, she writes:

The neighborhoods of Southeast Washington, D.C., are among the poorest in the city. There, the grocery stores, banks, restaurants, and other institutions that suburbanites take for granted have long been in short supply.

This cuts to the chase: things cost “more in money, time, hassle, exhaustion, menace” because those who live in poverty lack options, or have to choose between unappealing options. For instance, Dillon’s colleague Kevin Carey has noted that the only two sit-down restaurants east of the Anacostia River are a Denny’s and an IHOP:

But there’s another business thriving in the various run-down strip malls east of the river: dialysis centers. Wards 7 & 8 appear to have been struck by the diabetes epidemic that is afflicting communities nationwide. And the only two sit-down restaurants east of the river, parking lots full because these are the only options the free market provides, are in the business of selling their customers liquid sugar.

None of this is particular to DC; it’s endemic. PolicyLink found that in New York City, areas with poor supermarket access have higher levels of diabetes and obesity:

In Chicago, those who live in food deserts (areas with little or no access to healthy foods, seen in red in the map on the left) have higher body-mass-indexes:

The Post described the practical effect of living in a food desert:

You don’t have a car to get to a supermarket, much less to Costco or Trader Joe’s, where the middle class goes to save money. You don’t have three hours to take the bus. So you buy groceries at the corner store, where a gallon of milk costs an extra dollar.

A loaf of bread there costs you $2.99 for white. For wheat, it’s $3.79. The clerk behind the counter tells you the gallon of leaking milk in the bottom of the back cooler is $4.99. She holds up four fingers to clarify. The milk is beneath the shelf that holds beef bologna for $3.79. A pound of butter sells for $4.49. In the back of the store are fruits and vegetables. The green peppers are shriveled, the bananas are more brown than yellow, the oranges are picked over.

(At a Safeway on Bradley Boulevard in Bethesda, the wheat bread costs $1.19, and white bread is on sale for $1. A gallon of milk costs $3.49 — $2.99 if you buy two gallons. A pound of butter is $2.49. Beef bologna is on sale, two packages for $5.)

In addition, regardless of neighborhood, there’s a growing financial disparity between healthy and unhealthy foods:

Needless to say, our most impoverished neighborhoods are often the ones with the most health concerns (and we haven’t even mentioned other factors like crime, environmental racism, and lack of health care). Unfortunately, taking sick leave from work is another area where the poor are forced to choose between two unappealing options: going to work sick, or losing pay and risking being fired by staying home. Unlike in other nations, workers in the U.S. aren’t guaranteed paid sick leave:

And those who live in poverty are the least likely to receive such leave benefits - and the least likely to be able to afford taking unpaid leave. They depend on their paycheck to get them through the month. Unfortunately, as the Post details, those who live in poverty are often forced to waste a portion of their check at check-cashing establishments. As you can see, there’s only 1 check-cashing business west of Rock Creek Park in Ward 3, which is largely white and affluent:

In contrast there are almost no banks in Wards 5, 7, and 8. (This list, from 2007, is slightly outdated - there’s a Wachovia in southeast now, and also one at Georgia and T NW.)

As Joel Klein has said:

Schools matter and they matter big time in America. Sure, poverty matters, families matter, but schools can be the game changer…We’re never going to fix poverty in America if we don’t fix education.

Schools can be the game changer. But it’s undeniable that poverty and education are intertwined. This means that fixing education is all the more imperative. But there are strategic steps we can take to alleviate conditions of poverty outside of what we do in schools, and we need to do those things, too.

As swine flu continues to spread, the Post’s “On Parenting” columnist Stacey Garfinkle highlights a relevant issue in schools:

Handwashing properly … is one way to try to curb the spread of unwanted viruses. So, what’s the problem? Why is that so hard? Well, for one thing, elementary and middle schools are hit and miss when it comes to providing soap and regularly having children wash hands before eating. Preschool parents, on the other hand, nearly universally report that their schools perform lots of handwashing — sometimes on arrival and before meals and snacks.

Good to hear that almost all preschools are soaping up. But the phrase “hit and miss” suggests an element of randomness - i.e. one Montgomery County middle school has soap and another one doesn’t - that I’m guessing doesn’t actually play a role here. I’m going to go out on a limb and guess that schools in high-poverty areas are more likely to consistently lack soap or paper towels than those in affluent areas. The school I taught at, where over 80% of students qualify for free or reduced lunch, often lacked both. Given that students who live in poverty face increased health risks, the least we could do is make sure they have the opportunity for basic sanitation when they’re in school. I’d love to hear from others who teach or have taught in low-income - or, conversely - affluent areas on this issue.

Update: Stacey Garfinkle emails:

Thanks for pointing to my blog on Soap in Schools. I saw that you were theorizing about poverty, and while what you say may or may not have truth to it, I just thought I’d clarify the  “hit and miss.” phrasing.  I do indeed mean that one school in, say Montgomery County, has soap while another a mile away does not. If you look at readers’ response in the survey I put on the blog, only about 1/4th of just more than 200 readers say that their school definitely follows good hygiene standards.

Obviously, no children, regardless of where they go to school, should have to go to a school without soap.

Two recent news reports have me thinking about the limited influence schools have on children’s extracurricular social norms and habits.

A new study shows that banning soft drink sales in schools doesn’t really decrease children’s soda consumption.  Preventing students, particularly those in elementary school, from buying and drinking soda in schools is praiseworthy, considering the child obesity rate.  But students don’t learn to drink soda - or to consume other junk food - in school; prime influencers include their home environment, their peers, and the swirl of media images and messages in which they live their lives.

So why would making condoms available in school persuade kids to have sex?  It wouldn’t, but that’s the debate they’re having in Gloucester, Massachusetts after an epidemic of teen pregnancies has led the mayor and school committee chairman to push for contraceptives to be available in the school health center.  Truth is, kids don’t decide whether or not to have sex based on their school’s stance on the matter.  But providing contraception where need exists - and after 15 years on the downslide, the national teen birth rate is back on the rise - is a smart policy, and a proactive one, as opposed to the Nebraska safe haven law allowing parents and guardians to leave their children at hospitals.

We lampooned the new law in the Gadfly, and not without cause: due to a legislative tweak, parents can, and have, dropped off not only infants but offspring up to age 19, in some cases citing bad behavior.  (Update: One father dropped off NINE kids.)  But perhaps 200 words wasn’t enough space for Forhdam to acknowledge what lawmakers tried to: that some parents are not ready to be parents, and that the consequences of this are felt first and foremost by children.  In particular, most teenagers, I venture to say, are unprepared for the challenges and responsibilities of parenthood.  Wouldn’t it be better to try to address this issue before they had kids of their own?  We can do this - not by pretending schools can influence students to abstain simply by instructing them to do so, but by giving teenagers the opportunity and the ability, if they do have sex, to do so responsibly.