Southern Echo is starting the New Year with excitement and hope as we position ourselves to make a major impact on equitable public education funding and policies; and, work to substantially reduce poverty in Mississippi. We find it appauling that the legislature and MDHS has taken measures to cut Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, SNAP benefits, for thousands of Mississippi’s most vulnerable households at a time when child hunger in MS is among the highest in the country and the state ranks #1 in child poverty. Here’s a snapshot of child poverty and food inequity In Mississippi.
> Child food-insecurity: 28.7%
> Child poverty rate: 34.7% (the highest)
> 2012 Unemployment rate: 9.2% (tied-5th highest)
> Pct. with SNAP benefits: 19.4% (2nd highest)
Mississippi was home to the county with the highest food-insecurity rate in the nation, Humphreys County, where 33% of all residents were unable to reliably find three adequate meals a day. Mississippi buy phentermine tablets online continued to lead the nation with a poverty rate of more than 24.2% in 2012. The poverty rate for children was even higher, at 35% — the highest rate nationwide. Low incomes in the state help explain the high poverty rates. A typical Mississippi household made less than $37,095 in 2012, a lower median income than any other state. Mississippi had the highest obesity rate of any state in 2012, and residents were more likely to be diagnosed with diabetes and have previously had a heart attack than the vast majority of Americans. Sources: USA Today, USDA, Feeding America
Mississippi proudly boasts itself as a “Bible Belt” state, however, it appears that somewhere along the way, the principalities in high places totally missed “Suffer Not the Little Children” and “what you do to least of these, you also do to me”…How hypocritical and SHAME ON YOU!!
