News release: “America’s children have fallen further behind in the last year in a range of leading indicators according to The State of America’s Children 2011, a new report from the Children’s Defense Fund. With unemployment, housing foreclosures, and hunger at historically high levels, children’s well-being is in jeopardy. In the United States one in five children is poor and children are our poorest age group. In 2009, millions of children fell into poverty due to the economic downturn, an increase of almost 10 percent, the largest single year rise since 1960. Today, 15.5 million children are adrift in a sea of poverty and every 32 seconds another child is born poor. Two-thirds of poor children live in families in which at least one family member works. The gap between rich and poor families has continued to grow. Income gains for the bottom 90 percent were completely wiped out by the recession, leaving the average income for the bottom 90 percent at its lowest level in more than a decade.”