Poverty Levels at 50 year high!!!

[skookerasbil]

FT.com / US / Society - US workers? poverty reaches 50-year high


Is it absolutely aweome if you're a conservative these days??? How embarrassing is this?? Evidently "Hope and Change" really meant "Hope then Chains!!". Amid all the disasterous news of the economy lately, now this!!!

Check this sh!t out....................



US workers’ poverty reaches 50-year high
By Robin Harding in Washington

Published: September 16 2010 18:21 | Last updated: September 16 2010 18:21

Poverty among the working-age population of the US rose to the highest level for almost 50 years in 2009, as the human cost of the deepest economic downturn since the Great Depression was laid bare in new census data.

Poverty among those aged 18 to 64 rose by 1.3 percentage points to 12.9 per cent – the highest level since the early 1960s, prior to then-president Lyndon Johnson’s “War on Poverty”. The overall poverty rate rose by 1.1 percentage points to 14.3 per cent, the highest since 1994.

EDITOR’S CHOICE
Fall in US jobless claims offers hope - Sep-16.In depth: US mid-term elections - Sep-15.Editorial Comment: Obama should do more - Sep-07.Lex: Fiscal policy and economics - Sep-09.US industrial production slows in August - Sep-15.Rising US retail sales lift consumer hopes - Sep-14..The rise in working age poverty was driven by the jump in the unemployment rate to 10 per cent during 2009. It is a bitter blow to Barack Obama, US president, who campaigned on a promise to cut poverty, and the data may further harm the already difficult prospects for Democrats in November’s mid-term elections to Congress.

“The overall message is that we’ve erased all of the gains in poverty that were made in the 1990s,” said Elise Gould of the Economic Policy Institute, a left-of-centre Washington think tank.






Ooooooooooooooooops!!!!!!!!!!

 

[waltky]

Granny says, "Dat's right - yer poor an' den ya die an' den ya go to Heaven an' wake up inna riches o' the Lord...

Poverty often a temporary state, U.S. census study finds
March 28, 2011 - Many households below the poverty line at the beginning of a U.S. census study had climbed out by the end — and vice versa.

Donny Ashley misses the days when he was just barely poor. Sure, he commuted more than three hours each day to work as an electrical apprentice, but the paycheck — about $575 a week — put his family of four over the federal poverty threshold. But then the economy turned, and he lost his job. His wife managed to get work as a nurse but lost that job about a month ago. Now, having burned through their savings, the Watts family has gone from barely poor to officially poor.

"It's not a good feeling to be, not necessarily above the poverty line, but somewhat, almost having your head above water where you can breathe. Now I'm drowning," Ashley said. "It's a constant feeling of struggle, like no end in sight." A report released recently by the U.S. Census Bureau suggests that Ashley's roller coaster ride along the poverty line is not unusual. The study found that poverty was often a temporary state for households: As some families moved out of poverty, others moved in. The report also showed that many of those families that escaped poverty continued to generate only minimal incomes.

Using interviews from more than 43,000 households over 36 months, researchers found that of those who were impoverished in 2004, 42% did not remain so in 2006. The poverty threshold for a family of four is $21,954 a year — a figure that is adjusted annually for inflation and based on a decades-old formula that assumes families spend a third of their income on food. The threshold, which government officials call a statistical yardstick, does not directly account for the cost of clothing, shelter, utilities and other expenses.

Researchers found that although 11.7 million people rose above the poverty threshold between 2004 and 2006, 10.1 million dropped below the poverty line. The report also showed that of the people considered impoverished in 2004, 41.6% were not in poverty in 2006, yet more than half of them earned only 50% more than the poverty threshold. Chris Tilly, director of UCLA's Institute for Research on Labor and Employment, said the report represents a glass that can be viewed as either half full or half empty.

MORE

See also:

CBO: Employment, Economic Output Not Expected to Recover Until 2016
Friday, March 25, 2011 – The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimates that the labor force – and thus economic output – will not return to normal levels until at least 2016, meaning that the unemployment rate will stay above normal for many more years.

The finding comes from the CBO’s forecasts of the long-term changes in the labor force, published on Mar. 23, which estimate the size of the labor force based on demographic and population changes and the effects of current policies. Based on those factors, and the current recession, the CBO predicts that the labor force will not return to its normal size until 2016. The CBO explained that because of the weakened state of the economy, the labor force would grow faster than normal as the economy recovered.

However, the CBO also noted that the labor force (and thus economic output) would not return to its full potential until 2016. “Because of the weakened state of the economy, the labor force is currently well below its potential size,” the CBO explained in its background paper, Labor Force Projections Through 2021.

“[C]onsequently, CBO expects it to grow faster than its long-term trend between now and 2016,” said the report. “By that time, CBO projects, the output gap will have closed (that is, the economy will be operating at its full potential), and the actual labor force will be about equal to the potential labor force.” This means that the economy will continue to underperform, relative to its potential, until 2016, producing less and creating fewer new jobs than it would do otherwise.

MORE

 

[Mr Natural]

Thank you Ron Reagan and your trickle down voo-doo economics bullshit.

 

[skookerasbil]

Thank you Ron Reagan and your trickle down voo-doo economics bullshit.

WHAT???!!!!!!!!!!!

Nobody cares about Ronald Reagan s0n...............

 

[Soggy in NOLA]

Thank you Ron Reagan and your trickle down voo-doo economics bullshit.

This coming from the guy that divides a number by a smaller number and gets a fraction?

 

[Mr Natural]

Thank you Ron Reagan and your trickle down voo-doo economics bullshit.

This coming from the guy that divides a number by a smaller number and gets a fraction?

Hey, little Schmucky, didn't I recently tell you to eat shit?

Back for another helping are you?

 

[william the wie]

While blaming Obama for causing this mess is wrong blaming him for claiming he could fix it and failing is right on target.

 

[Dont Taz Me Bro]

I thought LBJ was supposed to have fixed all that.

 

[waltky]

Poverty creepin' into the suburbs...

'New breed of Americans going hungry'
10 May`11 - A growing problem with suburban poverty

The recession may officially be over, but Sonia Cruz of Issaquah, Wash., a suburb of Seattle, still finds herself having to say "no" to many things. No to the kids' request to go to the movies with friends. No to $1 Redbox movies. And definitely no to those trips to Cold Stone Creamery for ice cream. "There's no way we can afford that anymore," she says.

Cutting back became a necessity for many American families during and after the recession. But what the Cruz family and a growing number of other once-thriving middle-class families didn't expect was to find themselves qualifying for — and needing — the support of federally funded food assistance programs. After job losses, home foreclosures, mounting debt and bills some can no longer afford to pay, families such as theirs have become part of the new face of hunger in America.

Vicki Escarra, president and CEO of Feeding America, the nation's largest hunger-relief charity with a network of more than 200 food bank partners, says there is a growing problem with suburban poverty, "where new clients are individuals who have never needed to rely on the charitable food system." Hunger has been a challenge in the U.S., even when the economy is running on all cylinders.

At the end of the economic boom in 2007, 13 million people or about 11% of all households were considered "food insecure," the official term used by the government to define one's inability to access an adequate amount of nutritious food at times during the year. "Not everyone who is food insecure is literally going hungry," says Mark Nord, sociologist at the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Economic Research Service. "Some are able to head off hunger by reducing the quality and variety of their diets. But if food insecurity is severe or prolonged, it is likely to result in hunger."

Record number seeking food assistance

 

[Maseman]

Is it absolutely aweome if you're a conservative these days??? How embarrassing is this?? Evidently "Hope and Change" really meant "Hope then Chains!!". Amid all the disasterous news of the economy lately, now this!!!

Check this sh!t out....................



US workers’ poverty reaches 50-year high
By Robin Harding in Washington

Published: September 16 2010 18:21 | Last updated: September 16 2010 18:21

Poverty among the working-age population of the US rose to the highest level for almost 50 years in 2009, as the human cost of the deepest economic downturn since the Great Depression was laid bare in new census data.

Poverty among those aged 18 to 64 rose by 1.3 percentage points to 12.9 per cent – the highest level since the early 1960s, prior to then-president Lyndon Johnson’s “War on Poverty”. The overall poverty rate rose by 1.1 percentage points to 14.3 per cent, the highest since 1994.

EDITOR’S CHOICE
Fall in US jobless claims offers hope - Sep-16.In depth: US mid-term elections - Sep-15.Editorial Comment: Obama should do more - Sep-07.Lex: Fiscal policy and economics - Sep-09.US industrial production slows in August - Sep-15.Rising US retail sales lift consumer hopes - Sep-14..The rise in working age poverty was driven by the jump in the unemployment rate to 10 per cent during 2009. It is a bitter blow to Barack Obama, US president, who campaigned on a promise to cut poverty, and the data may further harm the already difficult prospects for Democrats in November’s mid-term elections to Congress.

“The overall message is that we’ve erased all of the gains in poverty that were made in the 1990s,” said Elise Gould of the Economic Policy Institute, a left-of-centre Washington think tank.

Amazing, isn't it? Thirty six years and many trillions of dollars later and the war on poverty achieves nothing. Thanks liberalism.

Of course, to the liberal results don't matter as long as you have good intentions. "It is always with the best intentions that the worst work is done."

Liberalism, making people dependent on others since 1933.

 

[Wiseacre]

The best weapon against poverty is more jobs. Redistribution of wealth doesn't cut it, giving free healthcare to millions won't do it either. And a freakin' speed rail system that will never make money sure as hell isn't the answer either. It's lower taxes and deregulation, the antithesis of the democratic party. If we don't make it easier and cheaper to start a business here or expand one, we're fucked.

 

[rightwinger]

The Reagan Revolution is finally bearing its intended fruit

Record Poverty levels
Staganant Middle Class
Booming prosperity for the wealthy

Trickle up economics if there ever was

 

[uscitizen]

Actually trickle down and suck up. Kind of an imbalance there.
Add in globalization and free trade and as I keep saying we must learn to live with less.