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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsUS teens often forced to trade sex work for food, study finds
Teenagers in America are resorting to sex work because they cannot afford food, according to a study that suggests widespread hunger in the worlds wealthiest country.
Focus groups in all 10 communities analysed by the Urban Institute, a Washington-based thinktank, described girls selling their body or sex for money as a strategy to make ends meet. Boys desperate for food were said to go to extremes such as shoplifting and selling drugs.
The findings raise questions over the legacy of Bill Clintons landmark welfare-reform legislation 20 years ago as well as the spending priorities of Congress and the impact of slow wage growth. Evidence of teenage girls turning to transactional dating with older men is likely to cause particular alarm.
Ive been doing research in low-income communities for a long time, and Ive written extensively about the experiences of women in high poverty communities and the risk of sexual exploitation, but this was new, said Susan Popkin, a senior fellow at the Urban Institute and lead author of the report, Impossible Choices.
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https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/sep/12/teens-america-hunger-food-poverty
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(29,503 posts)aikoaiko
(34,184 posts)flamingdem
(39,330 posts)and I expect everywhere, after housing it's the biggest amount to come up with monthly