The poor are not getting the attention they deserve from the presidential candidates.

Moderators are focusing on foreign policy and immigration rather than poverty, and candidates would much rather focus on more important topics, such as coming up with new, not-so-creative nicknames for each other.

The only candidate to consistently address poverty was Bernie Sanders. This strikes me as odd because about 14.5 percent of Americans are impoverished (around 45 million people), so it would seem like this is a worthwhile topic to bring up during the debates.

Hillary Clinton has plans, laid out in detail on her website, to increase minimum wage to $12 an hour, help low-income families afford health care and provide universal preschool for children across America. Donald Trump’s plan includes renegotiating NAFTA and prevent China from stealing American jobs.

While both candidates have some decent plans proposed on the issue, neither are publicized as often as they should be by the media or the candidates. Both plans for the most part are just recycled ideas of questionable effectiveness.

More importantly, child poverty rates are at an all-time high and this needs to be addressed by the President-elect. A Columbia University study found that children represent about 32 percent of all people in poverty, and it’s due to an endless cycle that contributes to that number. There’s no way to completely end poverty, but there are ways to fight it and reduce the number of impoverished Americans.

Donald Trump’s viewpoints on how the inner-city operates are vastly misconstrued, especially when he starts spewing out inaccurate facts.

According to Trump, 45 percent of African-Americans live in poverty; he then later got more specific and replaced it with “45 percent of African-American youth.” This number is exaggerated — in the U.S. census, about only 25 percent of African-Americans living in the “inner-cities” were in poverty.

While Trump has exaggerated the numbers, it is true that white households have almost a 10 times higher net worth than black households. There’s obviously a big disparity in education and opportunities provided as well.

Lack of education and a dying media spotlight are just two contributing factors to this ridiculously high rate of poverty. Some inner-city school systems also do not have proper quality funding.

There are so many ways an individual can help out, such as donating winter clothes or food to local shelters; however, action needs to be taken by major party leaders in order for things to change on a large scale. Even small things such as helping out schools with after-school programs and programs that educate students on personal finance would help.

For the bigger picture, intricate plans need to be created in order to raise the minimum wage while pacing it with inflation, which would be a lot more effective than instantly raising the minimum wage to $15 without factoring in the potential consequences. And Trump’s plan of cutting unneeded regulations on corporations would also increase the number of jobs available to Americans.

Both candidates have ideas that can benefit the poor, but neither is making it enough of a priority during the campaign.

Hopefully, whoever is elected on Nov. 8 will increase their focus on rebuilding the working class and providing employment opportunities to those who really need them.

K.J. is a freshman in DGS.

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