1) Poverty can affect anyone. Anyone can feel the effects of a lost job, a financial loss, rising expenses, the inability to get a good education or to afford quality healthcare.
2) You probably know someone in poverty. It may be a family member, a neighbor, a co-worker. It may be a person you see everyday but you never thought about how they live.
3) Poor people often have jobs. People in poverty might work in grocery stores, restaurants, hospitals. They might work on your car, fix your plumbing, or teach your children. They may work many more hours than most, yet their job doesn't pay enough to provide basic needs for their family or themselves.
4) Poverty is not a choice. Children born into poverty don't choose to be poor. Elderly people don't want to have to choose between medicine, food, and heating bills. The disabled don't choose to get hurt or have an illness.
5) People in poverty can do better. Community Action has had great success in reducing the effects of poverty. Helping parents with affordable childcare, finding job training for adults, asset building programs, stabilizing families, creating affordable housing and counseling all have a positive impact on reducing the effects of poverty.