0 to one in six americans. instead of treating it as a national emergency. as a new report from maria shriver and the center for american progress lays out, more than one in three adult american women now live in or on the brink of poverty. this is the face of poverty today. the face of america today. the war that lyndon johnson and sergeant shriver started half a century ago is nowhere near over. joining me now is maria shriver, whose father, sergeant shriver, led the war on poverty for president lyndon johnson. what was your father's vision for this program? it was his signature accomplishment, i think next to the peace corps, and he threw everything he had into it. what hid de want to see happen? >> well, he threw his heart into it. he threw his mind into it. he threw his soul into it. he threw his spirit it. and thank you for correcting, because all week long i've been vietnam? >> he was frustrated as was everybody who worked on the war on poverty in the office of economic activity. he didn't give up. he kept championing, trying to push lyndon johnson. obviously in the end the war in vietnam won out. i think johnson, himself, was deeply disappointed. this was a person who grew up poor, who understood and who felt that he wanted that to be his signature piece and instead the other war took him out. >> there is something deeply tragic about that transition. joining us now, economist betty stevenson, member of the obama administration's council of economic advisers. you, like maria, i imagine have been hearing the rhetoric of the war on poverty having failed. you did a report for the white house about the war on poverty. what's your response? >> that's exactly the question we wanted to look at is see how government programs affect poverty? what we needed was a measure of poverty that included the value of government programs, of taxes and benefits, transfers and benefits. and we needed then to look the at what would happen if we took those -- the value of those programs out. and what we saw is, perhaps, a little bit surprising. we found that -- we haven't made much progress, if you ignore all the government programs. so if you just leave it to wages and earned income, there hasn't been a ton of progress made in the last 50 years. i think what we saw is that education has definitely helped lift people out of poverty, but that's been fighting a headwind of rising inequality and eroding value of the minimum wage. now, once we added in the government programs, things like eitc, s.n.a.p., and we found that we'd actually done a lot to reduce poverty, so poverty over the last 50 years had fallen by nearly 40%. >> betsey, i think the big question, today, is that people are saying this is not the job of big government. you know, government shouldn't play a role. what do you think the president, because he's talking a lot about income inequality and economic mobility. what can he do today that would bring government to the right place, that would enlist business and individuals, themselves? >> well, that's obviously an important part of the things that we want to do to fight poverty. you know, the first stop on that is to raise the min puimum wagef you're working full time, full year, you can lift your family out of poverty. that's why the president endorsed raising the min puimum wage. he's also endorsed pushing people to get more education, get nr skills and asking businesses to do more to make sure there are wrungs on the ladder for employees to climb, get the skills at work, learning more, getting the promotions, building their skill set and moving up. because opportunity is at the heart of what we're trying to promote. >> betsey stevenson of the white house council on economic advise advisers. thank you for your time. >> pie pleasure. ahead on the 50 year war, we'll talk an the americans living on the brink just one crisis away from poverty. stay with us. [ male announcer ] what if a small company became big business overnight? ♪ like, really big... then expanded? ♪ or their new product tanked? ♪ or not? what if they embrace new technology instead? ♪ imagine a company's future with the future of trading. company profile. a research tool on thinkorswim.