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 Proliteracy In the U.S., 30 million people over age 16 — 14% of the country’s adult population — do not read well enough to understand a newspaper story written at the eighth grade level or to fill out a job application. Proliteracy 774 million adults around the world are not literate in their native languages. Proliteracy Over 70% of inmates in America's prisons cannot read above a fourth grade level. Begin to Read Low literacy costs the United States $225 billion or more each year in non-productivity in the workforce, crime, and loss of tax revenue due to unemployment. Proliteracy 44 million adults in the United States are unable to even read a simple story to a child. The Literacy Co. Two-thirds of students who cannot read proficiently by the end of the 4th grade will end up in jail or on welfare. The fourth grade is the watershed year. Dept. of Education Nearly a billion people will enter the 21st century unable to read a book or sign their names and two thirds of them are women. UNICEF 85 percent of all juveniles who interface with the juvenile court system are functionally not literate. Dept. of Education Penal institution records show that inmates have a 16% chance of returning to prison if they receive literacy help, as opposed to 70% who receive no help. This equates to taxpayer costs of $25,000 per year per inmate and nearly double that amount for juvenile offenders. Dept. of Justice Low literary costs $73 million per year in terms of direct health care costs. Pfizer Twenty percent of all adults, or 774 million, are not literate. Of those who aren’t literate, two-thirds are women. In addition, there are 75 million children who are not attending school and therefore not on the path to become literate. UNESCO |
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