CONNIE SNYDER MICK, Ph.D. | Engaged Teacher, Scholar, Administrator

While their economic platforms are markedly different, both candidates promise to create jobs but have said little about helping people while they are not working.

Source: The Millions of Americans Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton Barely Mention: The Poor – The New York Times

Pity Won’t End Poverty

Today’s Catholic is a Catholic news service dedicated to presenting important news, articles and information to the parishioners of the Fort Wayne / South Bend diocese.

The future has arrived, and it’s the thinnest of envelopes.

Source: College Admissions Shocker! – The New York Times

President Obama has been a lifelong advocate for the poor. As President, his life experiences inform his efforts to create a path of opportunity for all hard-working Americans to enter the middle class.

Source: Poverty

Notre Dame, Saint Mary’s students seek area residents to apply for loans.

Source: College student program opposes payday lending – South Bend Tribune: Local

In some parts of the country, adults with the lowest incomes die on average as young as people in much poorer nations like Rwanda, and their life spans are getting shorter.

Source: The Rich Live Longer Everywhere. For the Poor, Geography Matters. – The New York Times

The Great Recession may have ended in 2009, but despite the subsequent jobs rebound and declining unemployment rate, the number of people living below the federal poverty line in the United States remains stuck at recession-era record levels.

Source: U.S. concentrated poverty in the wake of the Great Recession | Brookings Institution

Since Indiana’s expansion began in February 2015, more than 235,000 previously uninsured able-bodied adults have signed up.

Source: In conservative Indiana, Medicaid expansion makes poorest pay

In a Capitol Hill speech billed as a repudiation of the tone of the 2016 election, House Speaker Paul Ryan apologized for his own past rhetoric about poor people of color.“There was a time when I would talk about a difference between ‘makers’ and ‘takers’ in our country, referring to people who accepted government benefits,” he said. “But as I spent more time listening, and really learning the root causes of poverty, I realized I was wrong. ‘Takers’ wasn’t how to refer to a single mom stuck in a poverty trap, just trying to take care of her family. Most people don’t want to be dependent.”Later, in response to a question from a Capitol Hill intern, he went further, saying of his past characterization of low-income Americans: “I was callous and I oversimplified and castigated people with a broad brush. There is a lot of that happening in America today.”For several years — as he has pushed policies to slash Medicaid funding, food stamps, unemployment insurance, and other social programs — Ryan has repeatedly referred to poverty as a “culture problem” among people in “inner cities,” where “generations of men [are] not even thinking about working.”His most recent poverty plan takes a punitive stance, punishing people who can’t find a job by a certain mandated deadline by reducing their benefits. While Ryan did express a willingness in Wednesday’s speech to evolve on policies like criminal justice, he offered no changes to this economic model other than more respectful rhetoric regarding the poor.When speaking about the 2016 presidential election, Ryan similarly focused on tone over content lamenting the state of political discourse “from both sides,” but declining to call out any candidate or any policy directly.“Our political discourse, it did not used to be this bad, and it does not have to be this way,” he said. “We don’t have to accept this, and we can’t enable it either…We should demand better from ourselves. We should demand better from one another.”

Source: Paul Ryan Apologizes For Calling The Poor ‘Takers’ | ThinkProgress