This week I attended the Rose Café with Chris Barrett where he talked about poverty traps, and how people become stuck in a reoccurring cycle of poverty. Specifically, he focused on farmers and herders in Kenya and Ethiopia, and how they are unable to escape the poverty cycle they are in. Simply put, these people are allocated land with the worst soil conditions because they are poor and at the bottom of the social food chain, and as a result they are not able to grow enough crops or maintain a large herd of livestock and thus they do not make much money. Because they do not make money, they are unable to move to better lands or improve their soil, and the cycle continues. While certainly not as severe, this reminded me of the poverty cycles that can be seen all across the US. For many people who are born into poverty, they will not have the opportunities they need to escape poverty, and as such when they have children they will also be born into poverty and the cycle continues. For example, in many low-income areas, the school districts do not provide students with an adequate education, and so it is much harder for the students to get into college or even graduate. This results in poor people being significantly less educated than their middle and upper class counterparts. Further, people living in poverty are not as healthy because fast food is often cheaper than good, nutritious food, and when money is scarce it makes financial sense to buy the cheapest food possible. This is the reason why many poor people in the US are obese and are more likely to suffer health complications, because they are eating lots of calories, but they are not obtaining the necessary nutrients they need to be healthy. As many poor people are obese and unhealthy, this also means they won’t be able to function as well throughout the day, and they would be more prone to having to call in sick. If they are sick and unable to work, then they do not get paid and they continue to be poor. There is a reason that Professor Barrett called it a poverty trap, because once you are in it, it is very difficult to get out. In terms of poverty traps in the US, I believe the best solution is to improve the education and job opportunities in low income areas so that young people have the means to either get a better education or a well paying job that would allow them to escape poverty.