Posted on 06/30/2010 4:23:23 AM PDT by Kaslin
Imagine you are an unborn spirit whom God has condemned to a life of poverty but has permitted to choose the nation in which to live. I'm betting that most any such condemned unborn spirit would choose the United States. Why? What has historically been defined as poverty, nationally or internationally, no longer exists in the U.S. Let's look at it.
According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the 2009 poverty guideline was $22,000 for an urban four-person family. In 2009, having income less than that, 15 percent or 40 million Americans were classified as poor, but there's something unique about those "poor" people not seen anywhere else in the world. Robert Rector, researcher at the Heritage Foundation, presents data collected from several government sources in a report titled "How Poor Are America's Poor? Examining the 'Plague' of Poverty in America" (8/27/2007):
-- Forty-three percent of all poor households actually own their own homes. The average home owned by persons classified as poor by the Census Bureau is a three-bedroom house with one-and-a-half baths, a garage and a porch or patio.
-- Eighty percent of poor households have air conditioning. By contrast, in 1970, only 36 percent of the entire U.S. population enjoyed air conditioning.
-- Only 6 percent of poor households are overcrowded; two-thirds have more than two rooms per person.
-- The typical poor American has more living space than the average individual living in Paris, London, Vienna, Athens and other cities throughout Europe. (These comparisons are to the average citizens in foreign countries, not to those classified as poor.)
-- Nearly three-quarters of poor households own a car; 31 percent own two or more cars.
-- Ninety-seven percent of poor households have a color television; over half own two or more color televisions.
-- Seventy-eight percent have a VCR or DVD player; 62 percent have cable or satellite TV reception.
-- Eighty-nine percent own microwave ovens, more than half have a stereo, and a more than a third have an automatic dishwasher.
What's defined as poverty is misleading in another way. Official poverty measures count just family's cash income. It ignores additional sources of support such as the earned-income tax credit, which is a cash rebate to low-income workers; it ignores Medicaid, housing allowances, food stamps and other federal and local government subsidies to the poor. According to a report by American Enterprise Institute scholar Nicholas Eberstadt, titled "Poor Statistics," "In 2006, according to the annual Bureau of Labor Statistics Consumer Expenditure Survey, reported purchases by the poorest fifth of American households were more than twice as high as reported incomes." That additional money might represent earnings from unreported employment, illegal activities and unreported financial assistance. A proper measure of well-being is what a person consumes rather than his income. A huge gap has emerged between income and consumption at lower income levels.
Material poverty can be measured relatively or absolutely. An absolute measure would consist of some minimum quantity of goods and services deemed adequate for a baseline level of survival. Achieving that level means that poverty has been eliminated. However, if poverty is defined as, say, the lowest one-fifth of the income distribution, it is impossible to eliminate poverty. Everyone's income could double, triple and quadruple, but there will always be the lowest one-fifth.
Yesterday's material poverty is all but gone. In all too many cases, it has been replaced by a more debilitating kind of poverty -- behavioral poverty or poverty of the spirit. This kind of poverty refers to conduct and values that prevent the development of healthy families, work ethic and self-sufficiency. The absence of these values virtually guarantees pathological lifestyles that include: drug and alcohol addiction, crime, violence, incarceration, illegitimacy, single-parent households, dependency and erosion of work ethic. Poverty of the spirit is a direct result of the perverse incentives created by some of our efforts to address material poverty.
To the extent that poverty is at least partially a spiritual thing or a state of mind, we still have lots of it. Then again there’s the question of how rich we might be if we ever threw off the present system of banking and money creation...
I was just wondering the other day - what is the total amount of money given to a poor family? Consider adding up:
Food stamps
Housing (Section 8)
Free Lunch/ Breakfast at school
Free Medical/Legal
Electricity/Heating/Phone assistance
Welfare
Head Start (Free Day Care)
Cheaper Mortgage Rate (re: Fannie & Freddie)
I’m sure there’s more, but there are so many programs, I bet it adds up to a pretty penny
....I grew up in a ‘poor’ single working Mom household in the 50s....we lived in an apartment, had no car, had no TV until I was in the 7th grade....we got along OK...it wasn’t the end of the world.
....I’d like to know the percentage of the urban ‘poor’ that have a cell phone, get their nails and hair done and wear designer clothes...probably close to 100%
Interesting.
According to Glenn Beck...if the Progressives succeed in equally redistributing the wealth world-wide...the approximate income per household, world-wide would be $14,000 per year.
“Then again there’s the question of how rich we might be if we ever threw off the present system of banking and money creation..”
////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
One can never know but I have often wondered how rich we might be if we had enforced the borders, if we had not become so soft and lax and young people still had some drive. I freely admit that as a young man I was rather purposeless, tending to take the path of least resistance (at least it seems so to me) and had less of a work ethic than my parents. I also liked to party. In spite of my failings I can look back and realize that I was a ball of fire compared to the vast majority of young folks I see around me now. When I think of what my parents overcame just to stay alive I cannot imagine what will happen if life should become that tough again.
Poverty is basically defined as the lowest fifth in every country.
It is allowed to vary for a few years and then is quietly readjusted ahead of its next political use.
The “urban poor” are the Obama base. They seem like him, trying to get out of much work. He just appears on TV for a half hour a day and then goes play golf, party, etc. And millions worship him.
Poverty is relative. Surrounded by vast wealth, people like George Soros, Bernie Madoff, and Michael Bloomberg spiritually live in a desert of hate where they must scrape in perpetual near starvation to find any sustenance for their withered souls.
They need their money, because they have nothing else. Madoff is the luckiest of them, because in prison, someone actually cares about him now.
“people like George Soros, Bernie Madoff, and Michael Bloomberg spiritually live in a desert of hate where they must scrape in perpetual near starvation to find any sustenance for their withered souls.”
wow, so true.
The left uses and encourages envy of “things” while never knowing true wealth in spirit.
Well done! Thanks
“Yesterday’s material poverty is all but gone. In all too many cases, it has been replaced by a more debilitating kind of poverty — behavioral poverty or poverty of the spirit. This kind of poverty refers to conduct and values that prevent the development of healthy families, work ethic and self-sufficiency. The absence of these values virtually guarantees pathological lifestyles that include: drug and alcohol addiction, crime, violence, incarceration, illegitimacy, single-parent households, dependency and erosion of work ethic. Poverty of the spirit is a direct result of the perverse incentives created by some of our efforts to address material poverty.”
Too true. Most of the abject poverty that I see in my community is people who (for what ever reason/s) intentionally and consistently make the worst possible choices in life, whenever life permits of fundamental choices...to work hard at school instead of goofing off; to choose the right friends and not losers who will drag you down with them; respect authority whether you agree or not; postpone marriage until maturity; postpone starting a family, and do so ONLY in marriage, until you can afford it; don’t do drugs....etc.
These people are everywhere because we have a society that refuses to stigmatize personal/social misdemeanors or social cop-out behavior. These parasites have children who they teach (if only by example) to be just as indolent and irreverent as they are themselves. We have a whole class of greedy, demanding and ungrateful people in America who basically thumb their noses at the system but all the while are parasites upon the very system they chose to ignore. These are the votes Liberals unfailingly claim in their stranglehold of lies, misrepresentation, oversimplification and with every other reprehensible trick that productive and even minimally intelligent Americans see as nothing more than pretense and deception.
I TOTALLY disagree with this analysis. If progressives succeed in equally distributing wealth world-wide, AND NO ONE STOPPED WORKING DUE TO THE FACT THAT EITHER 1) THEIR INCOME WAS BEING TAKEN AWAY AND GIVEN TO SOMEONE ELSE, OR 2) THEY HAD NO NEED TO WORK BECAUSE SOMEONE ELSE'S INCOME WAS BEING TAKEN AWAY AND GIVEN TO THEM,...the approximate income per household, world-wide would be $14,000 per year.
Clearly, no one would have any incentive to get out of bed and go to work.
These 'poor people' today have no idea of what being 'poor' really is. And we didn't take any stinking gubmint handouts. We, 'made do'.
How about a baby ripped from the womb? Their own doing?
How about a baby ripped from the womb? Their own doing?
Huh?
How true. I think many of us grew up "poor" by these measures. Since my parents came to America to start over, with only the shirts on their backs, we never had much to spare. I was certainly aware that we had less - our neighbors all owned their homes while we rented, we had no TV, our clothes were homemade, and we didn't take fancy vacations or go out to eat. Most of all, I know my parents worried a lot and worked their backsides off. However, they never took handouts, and we always had a roof over our heads and food on the table. The neighborhood was full of kids, and we had lots of fun together playing outdoor games. It was a different time, that's for sure.
In all too many cases, it has been replaced by a more debilitating kind of poverty -- behavioral poverty or poverty of the spirit. This kind of poverty refers to conduct and values that prevent the development of healthy families, work ethic and self-sufficiency. The absence of these values virtually guarantees pathological lifestyles that include: drug and alcohol addiction, crime, violence, incarceration, illegitimacy, single-parent households, dependency and erosion of work ethic. Poverty of the spirit is a direct result of the perverse incentives created by some of our efforts to address material poverty.
The poor you shall have with you always
Dr Williams is 73 years old and a national treasure
Great post!
Aside from people like Terri Schiavo or Karen Carpenter when was the last time you heard of someone in American starving to death? There are some deaths each year due to exposure, but in nearly all of those cases it was the person’s drug and/or alcohol problem that put them in the greatest danger.
Sure there are poor people in America, but to quantify poverty as a percentile or arbitrary dollar amount actually harms the truly impoverished more than anything else.
Indeed. Thanks for the ping, dear brother in Christ!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.