"The Pulitzer Prize-winning, bestselling author of Evicted reimagines the debate on poverty, making a new and bracing argument about why it persists in America: because the rest of us benefit from it. 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 every eight of its children to go without basic necessities, permit scores of its citizens to live and...

In the shabby district called Tortilla Flat above Monterey, California lives a gang whose exploits compare to those of King Arthur's knights.

Set in the mountains of southern Appalachia, the story of a boy born to a teenaged single mother in a single-wide trailer, with no assets beyond his dead father's good looks and copper-colored hair, a caustic wit, and a fierce talent for survival. In a plot that never pauses for breath, relayed in his own unsparing voice, he braves the modern perils of foster care, child labor, derelict schools, athletic success, addiction, disastrous loves, and crushing...

Angry and humiliated when his sharecropper father is jailed for stealing food for his family, a young black boy grows in courage and understanding by learning to read and through his relationship with his devoted dog Sounder.

Twenty-one essays discussing various points of view on the state of poverty in the United States and globally.

Explains how global poverty began with military conquest, slavery, and colonization that resulted in the seizure of land, minerals, and forced labor. Today's financial crisis is a direct consequence of these unchallenged policies that have lasted centuries. Features expert insights from Nobel Prize winners, acclaimed authors, university professors, government ministers, and the leaders of social movements. Includes interviews, photo galleries, and...

These are hard times in the Quad Cities, a great American crossroads along the border of Iowa and Illinois, where the Mississippi River intersects Interstate 80. It's home to John Deere manufacturing and the nation's breadbasket. But it's also an area deeply scarred by the Recession. FRONTLINE spent months following three young girls who are growing up against the backdrop of their families' struggles against financial ruin.

This book asks what it means to be poor. If there is enough food in the world to feed everyone, why does poverty exist? How does it affect peoples' lives, health, and education? What can be done to bring an end to poverty?