All children should be given the opportunity to prosper, and I acknowledge that it is vastly more difficult -if not impossible- for children from poor backgrounds to achieve the same success as those from middle or upper income backgrounds. But why? What does it take for a person to grow up to be a contributing part of society?

Children need food and shelter and education. They need relationships; they need guidance, role models, tough love and nurturing love. It takes a village. So which aspects and what percentage of the overall responsibility should fall on the government? In my town in Massachusetts, all children -rich and poor- go to the same schools. Those that cannot afford to buy breakfast and lunch are provided free or reduced-price meals. The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program is available. As is Section 8 housing. So why is a poor student at such a disadvantage?

We are all well aware of the skyrocketing statistics for births by unwed mothers (across all races). The divorce rate also continues to increase. And the correlation between single parents and poverty is clearly established. This problem will become exponential as more and more children are born to parents who cannot financially/formatively support their offspring, leading to more young, uneducated single parents and thus perpetuating the cycle. Since when does socio-economic status prevent someone from getting a twenty-five dollar marriage certificate or prevent them from helping to raise their offspring? The poor children in my community aren’t starving, don’t live in a tent city, and are all educated in the same K-12 schools as everyone else. Yet the statistics show that this doesn’t level the playing field.

My wife and I have two young boys, we are both educated, and it is a downright struggle day to day to raise our children even in our fortunate circumstance. Because of this, we will not be having any additional children, even though my wife would love to have a girl. Children are a tough, full-time job that we need to accept that not everyone is up to the task (never mind those handicapped by attempting to raise a child on their own). Yet somehow it is everyone’s right to have as many babies as they want, regardless of one’s ability to care for them, and this is clearly contributing to an expanding downward spiral.

When it is difficult for a government to take a neglectful parent’s children away, and when government can’t cap the number of children people are allowed to have, and when the government can’t force people to instill values in their children, how can we expect a government to solve this problem? And how is it fair that a responsible couple should forgo having children, yet we’ll cry foul for the poor because they do not have the means to raise two, four, six kids?

The government already provides food, housing and education. What’s absent in poor households are the non-economic factors- it is these factors that, at the margins, are the difference between a child who grows up to be a contributing part of society, and a child that does not. What would work in practice, in the real world -the place I live every day- to change this? And in the absence of effective government, where should we look for a solution? The future depends upon us finding an answer, and fast.

‘Big Jim Slade’ resides in Western Massachusetts.