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Economists: US Poverty On Track To Hit Highest Level Since 1960s
First time accepted submitter eentory writes "According to economists and other experts surveyed by the Associated Press, the U.S. poverty rate is on track to hit its highest level since the 1960s. The consensus among those surveyed is that 'the official poverty rate will rise from 15.1 percent in 2010, climbing as high as 15.7 percent.' Just a 0.1 percent increase would put the poverty rate at its highest since 1965."
http://i.imgur.com/olQxJ.jpg
Says it all.
Its only going to climb higher. I am up in Canada, but its the same here, all I see is businesses closing, programs being cut, the only jobs available seem to be for crap wages with no benefits etc. The economy is failing from the bottom up as the small businesses die off one by one. Meanwhile of course, the high end executives get massive yearly bonuses as a matter of course - even if the company they are working at is tanking and likely to go under.
"The first time I got drunk, I got married. The second time I bought a chimpanzee, after that I stayed sober" Arian Seid
I thought the idea was to give Mittens the reigns, let the corporations have 100% control of our country (vs the current insulting 98%), and hope for some trickle down?
There's a third alternative: Gary Johnson.
In the rest of the world, those amounts can actually buy you things like food and shelter.
Last I checked(and I check pretty much every fucking day), it's pretty goddamned difficult to buy food and shelter on that much money in the U.S..
People in the U.S. don't believe they are entitled to more. People in the U.S. pay more for things than people in the rest of the world, so people in the U.S. need more money to buy an equivalent amount of said things.
Enjoy your caviar, fucktard.
You think the last 4 years are what did this?
You don't think the last several decades might have had more of an impact?
This article is nonsense. My extended family is working class and none of them could ever afford air conditioning. They are what you might call the "working poor". Never mind "the poor".
That link sounds like the clueless ramblings of a modern day Marie Antoinette.
If the poor are "fed" or "sheltered" there is a good chance that this is only the case because of public assistance.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
We've outsourced everything and the capital hides in offshore accounts.
Should be no surprise that poverty is up.
Marx was right.
I don't read your sig. Why are you reading mine?
Congressional Republicans have voted down every proposal to help the economy the President has sent to them, even proposals tailored after Republican tactics for economic handling.
Remember this in November, vote the Republicans in the Senate and Congress out.
They are making the country and most likely you, poorer, just because they are in a pissing contest with the president.
They don't deserve your support
You know trickle down had some merit in a world before a telecommunications revolution and easy shipping. In that world corporations HAD to competively hire local people to get work done. We're past that.
Right now allowing the top 1% to make money off of easy imports of overseas goods is to the GDP what a empty calories are to your diet.
The true cause for this, wholesale adaptation of Reagan's economic philosophies, will never be identified or addressed, and the middle class will continue to shrink, and will only gain ground (temporary ground) during bubbles. And when those bubbles pop, the middle class slides back even more.
Nixon was a *much* better president than Bush II. He actually had accomplishments.
Bush Jr will get his proper place in history... as a person that used his 8 years (and an major terror attack that occurred on US soil) to funnel money to his buddies. I don't buy any attempt to say Bush was part of 9/11, but he sure as hell took advantage of it.
What did you expect? That link points to the "Heritage Foundation."
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
In almost all states it takes over 80 hours of work PER WEEK for someone making minimum wage to pay for a shoddy apartment.
You, sir, are an idiot.
Actually you're the idiot. I know several people on the gov't dole. And the ONLY reason they say do NOT get a job is that they would need to get a job pay X amount so it would be worth getting off the dole. They say why get off the gov't teat IF they(and their family) would be worse off.
Would you support raising the minimum wage so that all jobs pay more than gov't assistance?
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
We must save the American capitalism from these capitalists. I think a U Chicago economist wrote a book with a similar title. "save capitalism from capitalists".
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
It speaks volumes that the only "real alternative" available across the country in this election is one who would remove even more of the few regulations left to protect us from corporate excess. Look at "Gary Johnson's track record". He brags about being "an outspoken advocate for...protection of civil liberties", and a couple sentences later he brags about how he "privatized half of the state prisons". WTF?
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
That's a Republican lie. Wealth is not created in the boardroom, it's created in the programmer's cube, the recording studio, the factory floor, the fry-cook's stove, the copper mine. Wealth is created by the poor and middle class.
Wealth doesn't trickle down, it flows upwards. The wealthy don't create wealth, they aggregate and control wealth.
Free Martian Whores!
they are rent seeking parasites
a capitalist wants a marketplace of equals competing (which is only maintained by health regulations)
a rent seeking parasite will talk about capitalism a lot, but what they really want is their monopoly or oligopoly preserved. so any government regulation or taxation is evil and anti-capitalist... when of course, the monopoly or oligopoly whining about capitalism is the genuine anti-capitalist force
the greatest enemy of capitalism is not "socialism" (the random bogeyman curse word that has no relevant meaning in the USA), it is anti-competitive practices by entrenched large players, including corrupting our government
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
First off, working 80 hours nets you 100 hours of pay via overtime.
Only if the 80 hours are on the same job.
Finally! A year of moderation! Ready for 2019?
Malnutrition is down, but obesity is up. The symptoms of poverty change depending on social/cultural context, but it's still poverty.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
a rent seeking parasite will talk about capitalism a lot, but what they really want's is their monopoly or oligopoly preserved. so any government regulation or taxation is evil and anti-capitalist
That's nonsense. Rent-seekers ADORE government regulation. It puts smaller competitors at a disadvantage, erects barriers to entry, and if the rent-seeker is politically well-connected, lets the rent-seeker employ regulators as its personal enforcement arm against interlopers in its markets.
The news report quantifies the US poverty level as a pair of statistics:
But it doesn't go on to describe the lifestyle of a person in that income group. I mean, suppose a person chooses to live without a car, a yearly vacation abroad, or the latest iDevice. Surely that person's poverty level would be different from a person who chooses to have a car, take yearly vacations abroad, and buy the latest iPhone?
Let's start with the individual:
Average rent:$650 x 12= $7800/yr
$11,139 - $7,800 housing cost = $3,339 left
Average monthly grocery bill for a single male age 19-50 (without malnourished oneself): $250 x 12 = $3,000 grocery cost
$3,339 - $3,000 = $339 left
Average utility bill for > 700 sq. ft. apartment: $150/mo x 12 = $1,800
$339 - $1,800 = -$1,461
Go ahead and double the rent/utils, quadruple the grocery cost for the family of 4.
Lifestyle has nothing to do with it.
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
But in 2010, I had several employees in R&D mode, my net income was nearly zero, I fell below the poverty line. I actually qualified for some government handouts. That is seems absurd to me.
First of all, you were a rare edge case, so I don't think its "ridiculous" that you qualified for handouts. Your a really strange edge case if you're floating R&D people and your accountant told you not to pay yourself a salary at all for 2010. I think that if every person in America that was in your boat took advantage of the hand outs, its effect would be negligible. Secondly, lets say you continued to operate this way until you lost the house and car, wouldn't it be nice to know that you could just walk down to the benefits office and file for benefits.
--- Justin Dearing http://www.justaprogrammer.net/ We're just programmers.
Obviously, money doesn't trickle down. Rich people are richer today compared to anyone else since the '20s. If 'trickle down' worked at all, we'd be living a utopia with lower unemployment and poverty than ever.
The obvious problem with 'trickle down' and pretty much all Randian 'economics' is that it ignores:
a) the fact that most rich people don't get their money from producing,
b) the U.S. isn't a closed system, so Mr. Rich Guy very likely keeps and spends a large amount of his $$ outside of the U.S. (and if he's just investing it or keeping it in a bank there, the money is actually trickling UP rather than down), and
c) money hoarding. The idea that the rich are building new businesses with their cash ignores reality, where more money is being sat on right now than at any time in history.
It doesn't say that the poverty line is much higher today than in 1960, so implying that people are worse off is nonsense.
The poverty line for a family of 4 people is approximately $22K / year. Here are some basic expenses for a city-dwelling family of 4, assuming no public assistance:
Housing: 2-bedroom apartment - $850 / month * 12 months per year = $10,200
Food: $2 per meal * 3 meals a day * 365 days a year * 4 people = $8,760
Transportation: $2.50 bus fare * 4 bus rides per work day (assuming 2 working adults) * 20 work days per month * 12 months = $2400.00
Utilities: $50 per month * 12 months = $600.00
You now have about $100 left to pay for anything else you'd like for the next year, including clothing and health care. Yes, I'd rather be impoverished in 2010 than in 1910, but it's hardly a pleasant existence.
I agree that not taking assets into account is silly, but the poverty line is not too high.
I am officially gone from
Well, as far as what the OP was talking about...most any US citizen can take advantage of these type things...it just takes knowledge and a bit of initiative.
Anyone can incorporate themselves for a very small price...and use that to take advantage of tax write offs....you can use this vehicle alone to do some interesting things with your tax liability....and it is something open to any US citizen, you don't have to be wealthy....just have to have a bit of grey matter sitting on your shoulders, and use it with a bit of imagination.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
You should be taxed based on the percentage of income/wealth that you have. So if the top 400 families have half of America's wealth, it makes some sense that the top 400 families might pay half of America's taxes.
Also, the "50% of the population pays zero taxes" is total BS. For one, it looks only at federal income taxes, ignoring every other tax, including other federal taxes like the payroll tax - which is an insanely regressive tax that takes orders of magnitude more in percentage terms from lower-income folks than it does upper income folks.
It also ignores that some people, like those collecting only Social Security, won't pay income tax on that money. Or that other folks are too poor to pay income taxes. Before complaining that these people are paying zero percent, you should try living on $22k/year for a family of four (yeah, that's the official poverty line).
Those $50k/plate dinners that the politicians hold? Each plate that night is worth more than two families of four in poverty for a YEAR. Two men, two women, four children....one plate.
Fuck you, you inconsiderate prick.
:(){
You can do that...where you are, and where you can drive to the supermarket.
Try going to a neighborhood where there is a lot of subsidized housing, and try finding your raw ingredients anywhere you can walk to. Most supermarket chains have left impoverished areas, and the only place to get groceries are places like Dollar General or convenience stores. The selection of fruits and vegetables there is lacking, to put it mildly.
Go on, citizen, stamp the vote card. R or D, your choice.
Of course that doesn't (for your exact example) count the earned income credit 5,236, food stamps 8016 a year, free school lunches, and sometimes breakfasts for your kids, and section 8 housing which varies by locality, and money earned on the side by doing odd jobs.
Yes I've been poor, capitalism is the only way out.
No I'm not saying things need to be changed one way or another, just that you aren't showing the whole picture. I have two rent houses, one of them the good people living in meet poverty line threshold, and they both drive nicer cars than I do.
Rent is 550 a month for a 3 bedroom 1 bath house that is 900sq ft and that includes water utilities paid, and I used to live there it's a nice little house before you accuse me of being a slumlord. I'd live there tomorrow if I didn't have 4 kids and a wife.