How about a little ray of hope......................no, I mean REAL hope, not an empty campaign slogan.

To those of us of a more conservative nature the following statement might induce a very hearty DUH!, but you need to keep in mind that the Brookings Institute self describes as an "....institue with a left-liberal inclination....". Most often those on the left choose not to accept that their ideas fail time and again no matter how they claim them as "new" or "progressive". It's inconceivable that their ideas are rejected by those who recognize that reality, instead it's that not enough of someone elses time/money was "invested", or that they were outspent (see all the commentary following the whipping the left took last week).

This from today's Wall Street Journal "Notable & Quotable" section referring to Senate testimony last week. Maybe, just maybe, the more thoughtful on the left can steer their side back to reality:

Brookings Institution Senior Fellow Ron Haskins testifying before the Senate Finance Committee, June 5:


I want to emphasize the importance of individual initiative in reducing poverty and promoting economic success. Young people can virtually assure that they and their families will avoid poverty if they follow three elementary rules for success—complete at least a high school education, work full time, and wait until age 21 and get married before having a baby. Based on an analysis of Census data, people who followed all three of these rules had only a 2% chance of being in poverty and a 72% chance of joining the middle class (defined as above $55,000 in 2010). These numbers were almost precisely reversed for people who violated all three rules, elevating their chance of being poor to 77% and reducing their chance of making the middle class to 4%.

Individual effort and good decisions about the big events in life are more important than government programs. Call it blaming the victim if you like, but decisions made by individuals are paramount in the fight to reduce poverty and increase opportunity in America. The nation's struggle to expand opportunity will continue to be an uphill battle if young people do not learn to make better decisions about their future.