
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, October 31, 1995                   TAG: 9510310097
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A-4   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

BUDGET

GIVEN THAT budget plans passed by both houses of Congress demand the greatest share of sacrifice from poor Americans, it may be worth taking a closer look at this population. A few clues can be gleaned from data published earlier this month by the U.S. Census Bureau.

Last year, 14.5 percent of Americans were living in poverty, as defined by federally established income guidelines. But, of course, there are variations. The poorest among us are children, 21.6 percent of whom were living in poverty in 1994. That compares with 11.7 percent of the elderly.

Given these figures, it is interesting that Social Security is nowhere to be seen on the congressional cutting block, while Democrats' attacks against GOP budget plans focus mainly on proposed Medicare cuts. This, despite the fact that the budget plans would far more severely cut Medicaid, which covers poor children.

Meanwhile, the census bureau figures show the highest-income fifth of U.S. households gathering 49.1 percent of all income, a record share. Hey, what a good time to enact tax cuts disproportionately benefiting the wealthy!

This analysis is too simple, of course. The problem isn't simply that impoverished children don't vote. Most of the increasing gap between rich and poor has a lot less to do with federal policy than with broad economic forces, such as the globalization of the marketplace and the growing economic value of knowledge.

More often than not, children are living in poverty because they live in broken homes. The poverty rate for children in single-parent female-headed households is over 50 percent. The best bet against poverty isn't federal programs. It's marriage - combined with the opportunity to pull in two incomes.

Even so, it ought to astonish citizens that, rather than act as a counterweight to the growing income gap in America, Congress is proposing policies that could hardly be better designed to increase the gap. Few in Washington seem to be asking a question good parents ask themselves: But what about the kids?

by CNB