Our big chance. . . .today!

Any way you cut it, as a nation, we now face a huge opportunity to strengthen our country, to include more neighbors, to prepare our grandchildren for what lies ahead.  President Biden's plan presents a very practical response to national issues.  His vision seeks to make America better and more prepared for competition in our shrinking world.  

The first half of the current opportunity has to do with physical infrastructure improvement and literal rebuilding--bridges, highways, lead-lined water pipes, climate change curtailment, railways, internet accessibility, etc. 

To build our national, social infrastructure by really investing in our people, consider these real, tangible, very doable strategies to share the opportunity of America to a wider segment of our people:

• Lower child care costs to no more than 7% of a household's income
• Expand parental leave benefits
• Two years of post high school community college costs
• Fully fund early childhood education
• Increase maximum allowed for Pell Grants
• Lower prescription costs by allowing Medicare to negotiate costs with big pharma
• Add vouchers for Medicare participants that cover vision, hearing and dental costs
• Expand Medicaid for the extremly impoverished
• Use tax credits and government financing to bolster affordable and resilient housing, supporting the construction or rehabilitation of more than two million homes
• Extend the Child Tax Credit expansion in the American Rescue Plan, providing 39 million households and nearly 90 percent of American children a major tax cut and cutting child poverty nearly in half
• Increase the Earned-Income Tax Credit from $543 to $1,502. This will benefit roughly 17 million low-wage workers, including cashiers, cooks, delivery drivers, food preparation workers, and child care providers
• Aggressive jobs training program, including green jobs and education careers
• Invest in nutrition improvement by expanding SNAP benefits 
• Pay for it all with equitable tax reform that asks the very rich and U. S. corporations pay their fair share.  

An often overlooked fact of public investment in our people is that every dollar spent on our people moves quickly and completely back into the economy.  Nothing is lost, nor wasted as relates to economic stimulation and continuing growth.  

If adopted, this plan will assure the promise of America for generations.  It will cut poverty significantly. This plan will unite us as the benefits become obvious.  We can do better.  We can change for the better.  

Since 1970, I've been working on a daily basis with men, women and children caught up in the cruel reality of poverty and economic disadvantage.  Poor folks have been my very best teachers.  

One conclusion seems undeniable:  progress in our work to overcome the cruel,  negative impact of poverty on our neighbors will depend on a comprehensive, public, community strategy that bundles numerous assets and transfers them to the people closest to the problem, "the poor."

It is time to act and act boldly.