Child poverty creates long-term harm, violence that's avoidable

There’s a term that was developed in the academic field of peace research, and it deserves far more currency in political discourse and everyday language than it currently receives. It’s called “structural,” or indirect, violence, and, as the name implies, it refers to violence that is embedded in social structures or institutions. You can’t name a specific perpetrator as you would when an individual shoots, stabs, or suffocates another person. But structural violence inflicts no less harm than its direct counterpart.

In this political season, when there’s so much obfuscation about real issues...