16 million in America in “deep poverty”
In US, record numbers are plunged into poverty: report
The gulf between rich and poor in the is yawning wider than ever, and the number of extremely impoverished is at a three-decade high, a report out Saturday found.
Based on the latest available US census data from 2005, the McClatchy Newspapers analysis found that almost 16 million Americans live in “deep or severe poverty” defined as a family of four with two children earning less than 9,903 dollars — one half the federal poverty line figure.
But as long as the Limbaughs, Boortzes and Hannity’s of the world have theirs, then there is no problem. In fact, like clockwork expect Neal to harrangue these people as “losers” who shouldn’t have children if they can’t afford them. Wanna take a bet?
February 27th, 2007 at 6:44 am
in this nation, the limbaughs and hannitys lament the “welfare state”.
but for a moment i’d like to mention the concept of international welfare.
our “welfare mother” sort of welfare pales in comparison to aid packages we send to pakistan as economic leverage for them to become more commited to attacking the taliban, or al qaida, or whatever other boogy man we can cook up in the media.
same for israel, india, afghanistan, and who knows where else our money goes other than to our selves.
most of these are “loans”, at incredibly low interest, many of which are defaulted on over time.
which brings us to the concept, much ignored (as “ingnorant”) by the vast majority of american people, that our money isn’t our own, isn’t in the hands of the government. it’s privatized. in the hands of a powerful elite who, in the interest of profits and interest, encourage and make these loans. a hundred million dollars, even at a low interest rate, is still an incredible sum of money. do these profits trickle down to the general public in any valuable way? not likely.
i’m not a socialist. i don’t believe we should “spread the wealth”, from those who have to those who need, or whatever else was in the communist manifesto. but this wealth gap is pretty incredible.
as is the ignorance gap in this nation.