I just read a good article by Wendi C. Thomas in which she says that 80 percent of poor Americans have jobs.
The article contains some personal anecdotes about a few poor people. And it aims to help dispel the myth that poor people are lazy and do not want better for themselves.
Wendi C. Thomas also brings up Martin Luther King’s Poor People Campaign. Unfortunately, he was assassinate before the completion of the campaign. According to Thomas, King’s Poor People Campaign demanded more jobs with a decent wage, better unemployment insurance and higher-quality public education to prepare children for the workforce.
She also included a quote by King that is unfortunately still very relevant today:
“Instead of spending $35 billion every year to fight an unjust, ill-considered war in Vietnam and $20 billion to put a man on the moon, we need to put God’s children on their own two feet.” ~ Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
We can now sadly say the same about the war in Iraq!
King’s ideas still apply very much nowadays, and so far we have left his mission utterly unfinished. For that reason, I intend to read The Last Crusade: Martin Luther King Jr., the FBI, and the Poor People’s Campaign
Do you know any other good books about Martin Luther King and his campaign to alleviate poverty? If he were alive today, how do you think Martin Luther King would try to eradicate the large amounts of poverty? Please post your answers to those questions and your other thoughts on the subject in this thread at the World Hunger and Poverty Forums.