The first story that got me boiling was part of their poverty series they have going this week and today's story talked about the safety nets poor single moms need to get by. They talk about how children who grow up in poor families tend to end up becoming poor adults. The focus of the story is a 29 year old single mother who is fighting the good fight and trying to beat the odds! She has three kids from three different fathers (!) two of which are in prison. She has a full time job at a local non-profit but she's stuck because after eight years of working there she's maxed out in her position at only $9/hour. So she takes night classes twice a week and if she gets good grades her employer will help with tuition. If she graduates she can get a raise.
So her kids get subsidized round-the-clock day care while she's getting subsidized tuition, her employer also pays half the rent of her three bedroom apartment, she also gets food stamps, and medical aid for her kids. All with her $9/hour full time job. Boo hoo she has it so tough.
So after airing the story they have a mouth piece in the studio from the dept of Health and Human Services talking about the struggles of single mothers and how they need so much help. The interviewer asked why they tend to have so many kids and the answer was along the lines of “they have kids for many reasons, but whatever the reason is we should support them. Think of the children!”
You gotta be freakin kidding me. I'm 32 and my wife is 31 and we don't have any kids. This lady is younger than we are and she's already pumped out three kids. Part of the reason why we've chosen not to have kids is because THEY'RE A HUGE RESPONSIBILITY. Not that you have to be rich to raise kids, but they do come with a high price tag and we're not going to rely on government programs to subsidize the cost of raising kids. And what lessons are these kids being taught when they're either at school or round-the-clock day care because Mom isn't around while she's working or in class?
http://www.npr.org/2012/07/11/155103593 ... safety-net
Next story was part of a series about “What is the American Dream”. That's cool. They had some Korean families on. Oh neat, the perspective of immigrants about what they think the American Dream is. Makes sense. So the dream for these Korean families is to have their kids educated in US schools. So they move to the US (story doesn't go into whether they're illegal or not, schools don't check status either), and plop down in a community to get their kids through elementary school. Then they'll move to a community with a good middle school. Then they'll move to a community with a good high school. Go to college then high tail it back to Korea where they'll have a better social status there because they've lived in America.
Guess what lady? They're not invested in the school or the country anyway because they pick up and move back to Korea when their kids graduate. My goodness, this is crazy.In some other countries, like New Zealand, goose families are charged to attend public schools. Cooper says she wouldn't want to see that in the U.S.
"It doesn't sound like a very American way to go," she says. "It's a free country with a free public education, and if you start charging people, they're going to start feeling more like visitors. They're not going to be invested in the school and the country in the same way."
http://www.npr.org/2012/07/11/156377938 ... in-the-u-s
End rant.
