poverty

Increase US foreign aid. The US currently gives the LEAST % of GDP than all other industrialized countries. I think .7

Americans need to think of themselves as global citizens and collaborate with other citizens and nations in the world-- We can't afford to go it alone!

The United States should set a date from which it will be both free of poverty and nuclear weapons.

On Day One, the President should announce that the United States will begin the biggest anti-poverty program in world history by lowering all trade barriers, giving the poorest people in the world a chance to find their comparative advantages in order to participate in the world economy.

People die just because they just can't satisfy their hunger-- this needs to stop. The next President should address hunger concerns

Support farming diversity and family owned farms instead of ADM and Cargill,Monsanto and others. Food Security is National Security. Too much of America's food supply comes from outside America. Support grants and micro loans for famers markets,small scale farmers,urban and suburban farms and other diverse means of localizing our food. Please,enough is enough. There is NO excuse for green beans in China costing less than those grown 10 miles away.

Nicholas Kristof had a great column on Sunday about the "growing numbers of young people [who] are leaping into the fray and doing the job" that Washington can't. He offers Teach for America as a great example. It was a stated by a college student, and "has had far more impact on schools than the average secretary of education." I think that the next president should fund these entrepreneurs because while only one person will be elected, there's no limit to the number of social entrepreneurs.

www.americanprogress.org/projects/poverty/ Peter Edelman from the Center for American Progress Poverty Task Force says it's shocking the number of Americans who struggle to make ends meet in today's United States. Read the Center for American Progress's new report on poverty, FROM POVERTY TO PROSPERITY. What if our most powerful weapons were ideas? www.AMERICANPROGRESS.org

On a site visit to Tanzania we surveyed local leaders to ask them what they needed. In order they said they needed better access to food, water, basic medical services and education. The next President should address those needs.

We spend $23.5bn on foreign assistance, much of which is mismanaged and corrupted, and not ending up in the hands of those to whom it's intended (i.e. the poor!). The next president needs to make a concerted effort to reform our broken foreign assistance programs. We should use PROVEN models of assistance that will provide for wealth accumulation for the poor from the bottom up -- things like development of microfinance, conditional cash transfer programs, and child development accounts.