This graduate seminar, which will run the second half of the Fall 2023 semester, offers students an opportunity to better understand the nature of poverty in America today. Students will investigate poverty by drawing on history, social-scientific research, and reporting. Each week we will discuss a question central to understanding the causes…

The United States, the richest country on earth, has more poverty than any other advanced democracy. Why? Why does this land of plenty allow one in eight of its children to go without basic necessities, permit scores of its citizens to live and die on the streets, and authorize its corporations to pay poverty wages?

This undergraduate…