well that's all from us for this hour thanks for watching that coming your way now one about document she's so don't go anywhere. join me every thursday on the alex simon show and i'll be speaking to guest of the world of politics sports business i'm showbusiness i'll see you then.

so we raised the following question what if we could get every kid to follow 3 simple. graduate from high school. get a job and continue work and don't have the room till you're $21.00 and right now we've walked out at the entire country and we classified people according to

whether they broke all those rules or they followed one or 2 or all 3 of the rules the results are astounding. so i started talking to judges and lawyers and doctors and health providers and interviewing people and literally asked thousands of people how many of you had the course istria part of the united states and. we are segregated in america by social class obvious think about who the middle class people hang out with. most middle class people don't know someone in poverty by 1st names fit in down to dinner together. today

millions of american families are taught in circumstances beyond their control. their children will be compelled to live lives of poverty unless the cycle is broken. president johnson's war on poverty has this one goal to provide everyone a chance to grow and make his own way. i think everything in life that's important really lives in the grey like there's no black and white there's this gray how do we make it more clear of what the problem is there are so many different life experiences of poverty and we don't have a real clear definition of the federal government doesn't meet the definition they say if your family is more right about. to take care of your family for a year in 2000 does that mean that if you're making more you're not in red and that that's not the case i think the most. common.

way out of your current predicament. of course people cannot contribute to the nation if they are never taught to read or write. if their bodies are stunted from hunger. if their sickness going on him didn't care live to spare him hopeless poverty just drawing a welfare check. so we were asked. to opportunity. we're also going to give all our people the help that very meat. through goes. all of our well for you get money and you get more if you have less income go through have 0 income get the biggest money. and then as you earn money lose part of the benefit sometimes if you were even $1.00 extra dollar

a whole benefit medical. health for people and people who are disabled if that number seems low it should because it's based on 1000 fixed these cost of living in the sixty's economists came up with the formula for calculating the family needs and they said things like well we'll have a parent in the home so we don't have to include childcare people can walk to work so we don't have to include transportation and employers will pay for health care so we don't need to include that 3 major family expenses are not included in the 2017 federal poverty guideline where you have more women in the workplace than average in the history if you look at parents and divide their income into 5 equal parts and let's just 120 percent of this would be parents with income below roughly $25000.00 and now we come watch their kids grow up and we made sure their kids income. 30 to 34 years of age are they doing better than the kids from that bottom 5th of income below 25000 are twice as likely as we would expect based on

chance to be in the bottom it's very difficult to get out in the modern day it's a fight every day to meet your needs and the needs of your family. we're find some quarter 1000000 of our brothers sisters. parents or home along with our own apartment and a messed up. our military barracks more must be done to reduce poverty and dependency and believe me nothing is more important than welfare reform i think poverty to a large extent is also a state of mind poverty in a sense. how does piloted love. papa didn't have a loan. because he can put make up. the clothes on anything about sometimes if we struggled with poverty in

a certain way with him to the most most critical because we say well we didn't i pulled myself up by the stress i got it done i struggled i had to work 2 jobs i did it well your situation is not the same somebody else is because we're individuals and our characteristics our personality our network of people our demographics of the area that we live in are different that we can't take 2 people from different sections and say well this person did it he must be good and this person didn't do it they trained elephant by saying the elephant was a little girl when a young. man elephant growth of the bull found them all the elephant. and put the same little rope around that elephant. but that elephant is a condition only go in far as a rope will lead. anywhere say wait a minute cases of people as he has a little rope around their mouth. will will only let him go so far.

you know enough of. so far here with your. newly grew up. the same little rope you're talking about. it only goes towards. the 2 most important thing is where you're born and who you're born to so this one guy he said i'll do your study for you he said i grew up in poverty and i said thank you so much i said tell me how did your family get by he said well my father was a physician he died when i was 12 i had to go live with grandparents i worked in their store i pulled myself up by my own bootstraps i had the right mindset and i was determined and i became a doctor like my dad and i'm listening to him through the eyes of somebody who's bought her 5 brothers in the back window of the car and i'm thinking you knew someone who owned

a store and you were related to bill. but if you look at it from his context his experiences who are the children a professional singer. typically it's going to be other children of professionals and what people do is we compare ourselves to the people around us and we sometimes put an umbrella and say poverty is just poverty and that's not that's not true that's not the case it's so difficult to come up with a solution to help someone we don't understand the problem ourselves how can we work together how can we understand each other and the answer is we have to accurately understand poverty what is poverty about. so understanding the perspectives of people who live in generational poverty or working class poverty or immigrant poverty or situational poverty there's so many

different life experiences of poverty and we use one word to describe them so many people they've they have no idea if you're born into a poor family you're born into a minority family if you're born into a family that only has a single parent that really constrains your life chances people die on average 15 years younger if you're born into generational poverty. only 70 percent of the people born into generational poverty move out so you move a lot and you just get through the day and life becomes about getting through the day generational poverty is the deepest part radio cycle out of any people and generational poverty are working 1.7 jobs and to decide between paying more. that's the kind of poverty i come from where most of my family members can't read and write there's high mobility of simply a victim you're going hungry to have nutrition if you don't really really sick

eulogists really just hope they give you sales. by the prescriptions working class poverty is a little different you're living paycheck to paycheck don't have a lot left over but know that checks coming so you feel like you have a little more control over your life but they're very hard on themselves they buy into the idea that if they work or don't make it and they have the labor statistics they without an education or skill or your whole life. and then there's any poverty where you have people who are struggling with housing transportation child nutrition out of your basic human needs and in addition to that you have the language barriers the cultural barriers the us the discrimination racism to live to move really big obstacle. to address to really develop to their potential and then you have a situation of. passing by and making him middle class where you were in the womb you know middle class family structure you're nothing at all to you maybe have

a divorce and you fall into poverty or maybe you get downsized in your job and you fall into poverty those are the ones that sometimes don't find their way into our numbers that didn't fill out the papers for the free and reduced lunch. so in america we like to thank that everybody who works hard has a certain amount of talent can make it and can join the middle class that's the american dream and past generations the american dream seem to be working pretty well it's not working as well now we always think that in america on the theory of the land of the brave equal opportunity and that's just simply not true. it's. just. the same. steve. said. go to school

so. through education you can also better yourselves in other words you learn how to learn how to think critically and find solutions to unexpected challenges education also teaches you the value of discipline but the greatest rewards come not from instant gratification but from sustained effort and from hard work. and finally with the right education both at home and at school you can learn how to be a better human being. imagine picking up a future textbook on the early years of the 21st century what are the chapters called gun violence school shootings homelessness 1st it was my job then it was my fear of dylan was my savings i have nothing i have nothing that is not like

aloof or resources i look for jobs i look for everything i can to make this house. in oil and doing this. the road to the american dream paved with did refuse it's this barry idealized image of america needs americans look possed the deaths that happen every single day this is a modern history of the usa america. but i think israel has. genuinely and to some extent in a manipulative way. feared any strong state in the region and iran in that sense is a psycho political threat. more of them than i think a material when it's used to be material carette is used to

manipulate in part of the israeli public which is very divided now and they need symbols of unity and one of them is the iran threat. when you look at the landscape of our community and i want the things that keeps me up at night is. our education attainment rates. 70 percent of our citizens our neighbors that live with us have no post-secondary credential today's economy is very demanding skills and skills means education getting a job these days with just a high school education is a lot harder than it used to make the chances are you're going to be in poverty or close to be especially if you're trying to support a family. why did 20

different focus groups i did surveys i did interviews expecting to find that students were afraid of which they are that students need more tutoring which they do but those weren't the barriers that students identified that were keeping him from being successful in the classroom what students told me overwhelmingly is the biggest barriers to their success in the classroom had nothing to do with the classroom transportation childcare health care housing food utility payments statistics show that college is a very successful way to go and it's still the best decision for students or anyone who wants to get out of poverty or level up in what they want to do however i also think that the worst thing to do is go to college and drop out years ago the goal is to graduate you get a graduate thank you just can't drop out because unlike anything else you still got to pay the bill.

now what higher ed would do is they would look at those success rates and they would go oh our students aren't as well prepared they're not smart they don't know how to study they're not dedicated and i think what we've learned of them really. colleges those aren't true at all our students are smart they're ambitious they're capable they want for themselves they're burdened not just provide a future for themselves but to save their families but they have real barriers that they bring with them if we're going to fulfill our mission in higher education we've got to understand those barriers and address them if we want our students to be successful in the classroom. you know i teach people that if you don't get

educated you don't get skilled you going to be poor your whole life and so will your children is an absolute exception of the person who is living you know so will say well my a little makes a 100000 and he's not educated but i'm quoting labor statistics and census data that's an exception i didn't know what i wanted to be and so after i graduated from college i think that that's somewhat normal but i went ahead and i i went to college and i picked the major and i was glad that i had people in my life that encouraged me just to go ahead and go in a lot of people because they've learned that they've been sent messages that they're not smart enough they're not good enough they don't try and tell you to. get your high school diploma get your college degree and then keep pursuing what it is that you have a skill set for and you're passionate about one of the hardest most heartbreaking things about not having your d.d. or your high school diploma is sometimes you hit a ceiling at work or you miss an opportunity we don't want you to miss we we want

people to have those are. the best you know i'm not i asked them a lot of walking around but i graduated man education and you need to plan. one of things i think we're really not talking to high school students about this subject that i like to call success we teach english we teach math but we don't teach except which regardless how smart you are in any of those other cattle. if you understand the subject of the best way to lose basic fundamentals of understanding you know how to network how to communicate would be bold but also how to be strategic realizing what's important. college is not about how smart you are it's about how hard you're willing to work every cost we should expose. it shows the average income of people who drop out of high school

and people who graduate from high school but doable for the kids who get a 2 year degree in kids who get a 4 year degree when they get to be adults with different. levels for the education . over the last 3 or 4 decades and if we can show the kids and make them understand and say you know if i get more education i'm going to make more money and that will have an impact on every other part of my life the most important thing is not the freedom to buy things it's the freedom to dream and chase what you really want to do the more money you can make and now and not spend it it allows you to dream at a place and give you the oxygen and during where you're not thinking short term. i don't think that i think is so important to understand is how poverty steals your hope. and your confidence i was talking to 2 students at my t.

place and i loaded one up on my car brought them over here walk them through the process got him signed up we got a man rolled and then that student told me after we got him a schedule when it came time to go to class but the 1st day he said in his car in his parking lot for 3 hours i couldn't get out of the car. that's that's not because he won smart capable or he didn't want to do it that's because he was a brave. that's real but it can't be an excuse everybody in their life everyone has fear i just challenge you to work through your fear and don't let fear keeps you from being your best self give out my yourself when you are educated and when you know the things that you know and you know how hard you work. you need to create this story for yourself you need to surround yourself with

other people who are going to cost ability and do not allow negative people or negativity to talk you out of your dream. what are your passion about what you have skills that are and in the meantime pursuing your education you have to understand that you have so much purpose between 1024 that the decisions you make not only going to pack they're going to pack your kids and your grandkids you don't even know who's going to benefit from the little decisions you make today you may not see it but your grandkids will definitely see.

that it was for. i was true. she was going to be. and and i'm telling you. from the moment she decided she was going to be a singer and to have that really a little girl at that point. every time i saw her do the work think about. you know this work ethic that she had was this week an amazin i mean you know as a kid authorise thing and all the things and then when we started this church in downtown houston our family joe and brought the kids to an assistant and she joined a choir. and every now and then she'd get a fellow and she would put more into that fellow than the whole choir would into the whole 12 and now she is on the largest platform in the world and

they would be a thing. all because of the work ethic of me young woman who made a decision to what she was going to do and be in life. and allowed no one to get away will everyone be a. no. that's why you got to have a plan a a plan b. and a plan c. . we have hard workers in this community whether they're students in amarillo college or employees in the community we have a really hard work ethic the issue is they're underemployed so they're working really hard and not making a living wage doing already is i work in a crisis is $1.00 jobs and still i can't put food and pay rent i have to make a choice so we say you just got to work harder in order to to make it that's not true not when you're experiencing poverty because people in poverty are working.

i started looking at who's the number one teacher of poverty in the united states of america and the answer that i found was the media so what's the average person going to know about poverty and the people who live. then it is probably going to be things like whether get rich off welfare if a kid in high school is thinking it's not that big a deal as long as i have kids i'll be fine i'll be getting well for all the good and casual for will be covered by medicaid i can get housing and so. it doesn't happen that way in 1906 my welfare check before going to any dollars jennifer was 6 daniels to my 15 year old homeless cousin was living with me and they said we won't help her because she's not yours will give you $400.00 my rent in a neighborhood. in portland oregon was 395. but then do the math a welfare check today birth family of 3 national average or 78 that's

196-2000 17 the average rent according to had a modest apartment 750. the average disability check is $750.00 fiftieth's it's almost impossible to get out of poverty based just on public but. our labor statistics say if you take a minimum wage job and you work 10 years and you don't have education beyond high school you don't have a skill like an electrician or plumber the average increase after working hard for 10 years in a person's income is $2.00 an hour didn't matter how hard you were big about it who works harder the person cleaning the hotel room or the person in their office you don't move out without a skill or an education so if you want to buy your mama house going to make sure your kids don't go hungry can't get a skill got a good education now if you want to on say start all that 30000 a year and have the possibility of up to 60 or 70000 you know who have to have skills you have to be talented and have to know how to do you need what we call

soft skills and hard skills parts skills are just you know being technically trained to do something take computer literacy anybody who goes through school these days and isn't computer literate is going to be in trouble. and i think our schools should be doing a lot more if they're not already to teach people programming and coding skills and the whole set of things you can't get a decent job anymore if you don't have those skills either the soft skills and if you talk to employers employers will tell you that they're really missing the soft skills as much as the hard skills the soft skills are things like getting to work on time dressing appropriately knowing how to interact with other people knowing how to be polite with a client or a customer knowing how to rob them solved knowing what to do when something doesn't go quite right you know being a bit creative. one of the things that helped me in my personal life

was to see other people maybe of my same skin color or or city and and see them succeed so it becomes attainable you don't know what you don't know and i think a lot of times is that's what i think holding people back and they don't know it's bigger than their town and they don't know what they can do bigger than what they see on t.v. and the people they see at school and the people that their parents are. used to work in elementary schools and yes the kids what they want to be in life and they want to be doctors and in a lawyer but if your home life doesn't support the teen ability of those things. it's a nice dream but it's not a reality in certain groupings neighborhoods don't have that exposure so it's important that our schools our community. itself and expose especially the youngest kids to that.

because there's a saying. that they're going to cheat. and then you went through all that come through school but you. ideas there right to scold your skull he said to me you. look too fast. this country. this is what we don't understand how we are in such a country. the nurses are the ones at the same time. noticing fundamentally. similar the similar. one. because. the middle of on board not the god can we believe they get to the front of the computer with the plane to. come back to the 3 story you have to see.

the best. you. believe you. anger in france runs into a 2nd weekend over a bill that could stop the public from filming the police but the government insists it was cracked down also to come on the weekly. the wild west upgradable proxied russia says it's covert job will cost less than $10.00 per day as it plays out sputnik seems to you add. on to it if you made out and degrade a gay rights group accuses the e.u. of having its own guantanamo by ignoring hundreds of its citizens held as a suspect in camps in syria.