I am writing in response to Sheldon Danziger’s “The Mismeasure of Poverty” published in The New York Times on September 17, 2013. In the article, Danziger objective was to expose the truth about poverty and bring to light and purge the distortion surrounding the poverty rate. However, his task from there goes beyond just baring the truth and sets him on the path that leads him to ultimate reasons explaining the misstated poverty rate and how it can be rectified. As he makes his way through a tangled web of information he turns to a profusion of facts and a glossary of useful phrases to drive his point home. Danziger starts out by bringing a shocking statistic to the reader’s attention, and then immediately shooting it down. He states that, …show more content…
However, this remains my only complaint about the structure, because immediately after the fact, Danziger reveals the statistic that most heavily supports his claims about the mismeasure of poverty. He notes that rising corporate profits and stagnant earnings, income and poverty rates are the reason that many people live poorly. At this point, it seems that Danziger is finished presenting his points and he goes one step further to explain how the problems he presents could be solved. He makes the case that “a poverty measure that incorporated all anti-poverty policies” would show “how painful cuts to those programs could be,” in this case calling on politicians and government officials to help create this measure. He focuses on the same audience again two paragraphs later when he urges policymakers to create antipoverty measures. Danziger’s specific solution and direct address to policymakers make his conclusions and objectives easy to follow and perhaps, easier to put into