Focus: People in our Community Objective: To develop an understanding of what it means to be poor in the United States – and to begin to make meaningful connections between the official poverty numbers and the real-life situations they represent. Introduction: Most people in the United States of America have what they need to live in comfort. Most people have enough food to eat, enough clothes to wear, and enough shelter to be safe. However, in the United States today, there are nearly 35 million people living in poverty.  People are said to be “living in poverty” when they do not have enough of what it takes to fulfill basic human needs. A person can be poor when he or she lacks the essentials of daily life, such as a sufficient amount of food to keep them from being hungry. A person can be poor if he or she works hard at a job but doesn’t make enough money to buy the things needed to be healthy and secure, such as proper clothing to keep them warm in cold weather or health care to help them when they are sick. Who is poor in the United States? This is how those living in poverty would answer. We are White. We are African-American. We are Hispanic and Native-American and Asian, too. We are young and we are old. We live in cities, suburbs and in the country. We go to work and go to school and go to church. We are concerned about raising our children well. We help others who are in worse shape than we are. We sometimes depend on the kindness of others. We are one out of every six children in America. We are one out of every eleven families in America. We aren’t all the same.		site resources...   • Take a tour of Poverty USA and learn what it's like to make ends meet when you're living in poverty. • Visit our multimedia gallery to experience poverty through TV, radio and print public service advertising. • Download a banner ad or e-sticker to display on your Web site. • Test your knowledge about Poverty USA by taking the poverty quiz. • Help spread the word about Poverty USA and nearly 35 million living in a state of poverty • Review the Poverty Pulse survey results to better understand American attitudes toward poverty. • Get involved and help reduce the population of Poverty USA with a hand up, not a hand out. • Email a friend about Poverty USA. • Share your thoughts on the Education Center by taking this survey.     • Click here to review resources designed for Catholic educators.