Does anyone who’s spent any time with kids from poor nabes deny what Newt says here? Both my wife and i,her more then me, taught desperately poor kids in terrible nabes. These kids had no one in their lives who obtained cash through work. They had zero understanding of the relation of work to achievement, and this showed in their approach to school. I don’t think the govts,city, state, and federal could possibly have enough placements for a 14 or 15 year old to learn work’s value and the unions would scream child labor if they tried, but Newt’s absolutely right about the problem. And if you examine the snotty white OWS kids, I think you’ll find a preponderance who grew up with an absent,divorced father paying the bills and no correlation to dad’s getting up and going to work with the clothes, vacations, tuitions, and Christmas presents.
>>if you examine the snotty white OWS kids, I think you’ll find a preponderance who grew up with an absent,divorced father paying the bills<<
The poor I work with, have no bio-father present, and mom is in jail. They are being raised by older sibs and relatives. What we would describe as a *intact family* is not present.
Starting in the teen years, what these kids desperately need is a vocational education [building trades, agriculture, engine repair, culinary, etc.]; instead they are *all* told to go to college. For a long time, kids were steered away from the vocational schools in CT and there aren’t too many of these programs left.