dr. laura lein, the dean of school social work at the university of michigan. and kay brown, director of income security at the united states government accountability office. thank you all very much for taking the time to testify to senator hatch having very important and we look forward to your testimony. we encourage you to be candid, forthcoming and direct in your five, six statements statements but your prepared remarks will automatically be included in the record. why don't you begin. >> thank you, mr. chairman. members of the committee, thank you very much for inviting me. it's a great privilege to testify before this committee. i want to talk about four issues in five minutes. that makes me an issue a minute man. >> you got it. we're going to time you, too. >> what? >> i'm just teasing you. i said we're going to time you and hold you to that, too. >> okay. >> go ahead. you can say whatever you want to say. >> i get this 30 seconds back. poverty trends i'll talk about, spending on programs and major causing of poverty. issue one, the trends in poverty. i

dr. laura lein and kay brown. that all of you for taking the time. was going to act on something important relative to your testimony. i encourage you to be forthcoming and direct in five periods yours remarks will automatically be included in the record -- i encourage you to be forthcoming and direct in five or six minutes. your remarks will automatically be included in the record. dr. haskins. we are going to time you, too. >> i will talk about spending in the program and what we should do about poverty. i included a figure in my testimony. it has done too big surprises in it. one is that we have made no progress in poverty since 1975 despite the fact that we are spending a ton of money. the rate of poverty for seniors is lower than for children in our society. those are facts that we need to focus on and we need to especially concentrate on children. eshoo to -- issue two, we spend money on means tested programs. the idea that we are not spending enough money is probably incorrect. some of the programs might not be successful but we are spending $