Let the Good Times Roll: 1 Million More Americans in Poverty in 2004

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Whoha
while we simply can not keep this up, there is no way the Chinese home market will be able to absorb their production.

The production will inevitably shift to another country. I reckon the low tech light industries, textiles, etc., will be the first to go, to places such as India, Bangladesh and Nigeria. Then it will be the low tech heavy industries such as steel. Industries such as raw material extraction will probably go relatively quickly too.

Originally posted by Whoha
I was listening to a Nucor guy on C-Span eariler a few days ago talking about how China was projected to have triple the current world excess steel capacity in the next 5 years.

I think he's silly.

[Ted Striker]

Originally posted by Mrs. Tuberski

To find out, Ehrenreich moved from Florida to Maine to Minnesota, taking the cheapest lodgings available and accepting work as a waitress, hotel maid, house cleaner, nursing-home aide, and Wal-Mart salesperson. She soon discovered that even the "lowliest" occupations require exhausting mental and physical efforts. And one job is not enough; you need at least two if you intend to live indoors.

Most jobs have exhausting and physical efforts. This is not new. Now granted the foodworker and housekeeper are not paid as well as ur dr or dentist, but they both do the same if not more work. Though i see this comparison as apples and oranges truth be known the same amount of time and effort is going into the work and task at hand. If you ask me this country spends way to much money on fantasy and tv land. Were the hell was it written the athletes and movie stars should make millions for entertainment purpose. You have folks working their asses off for minimum wage and have the sports stars and movie folks demanding 30 million for one film and or one season How insane is this??? I will tell you very, cause it is you the consumer that pays that salary, and continue to allow this insanity by continuing to pay the outrageous prices for movie tickets and tickets to the shows etc.

YEP

We got our priority system all screwed up. NO athelete or movie star deserves $30 million for what they do.

That is an abuse of the "virtuous" free market system. The sad thing is most of us will continue supporting these abuses.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Smiley
Ironically though its the entertainment industry that keeps the US from sinking into complete third world status, as almost all other industries are uncompetitive without subsidies.

I reckon the US still has some first class industries such as semiconductors and banking.

[Ted Striker]

Originally posted by Vanguard


Lol. It's also a leading indicator of a country in decline. So what?

The poverty rate has risen for four straight years, yet as I recall you have been touting the economic expansion for all of that time. How far behind does this "trailing indicator" follow? A decade? Two? If you ask me, it looks more like a counter-indicator---- at least for Bush's economic policies.

In fact, the rise in the poverty rate is largely a direct result of the Republican party's deficit financed tax cuts for the wealthy. This "policy" (I hardly dare dignify it with the term) is nothing more than a transfer of wealth from the middle class to the rich. Which drives some of the middle class into poverty, thus increasing the poverty rate.

Eventually it will destroy the middle class and consequently the US economy. But that probably won't happen until Bush is out of office and can blame it on someone else. And you, no doubt, will be there to help him do it.

Word

Tax cuts for the rich.

[Ted Striker]

Originally posted by Saras
American notions of "poverty" disgust me. You guys have no clue what poverty is.

Maybe you should try living in one of those impoverished areas and tell us who has no clue then?

[Saras]

Originally posted by Ted Striker

Maybe you should try living in one of those impoverished areas and tell us who has no clue then?

Cry me a river.

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by Smiley


Yep, DanS would post a thread every month at the beginning of the month, titled "Let the Good Times Roll: X number of jobs created in (name of month)".

This month has been the first in a while where there has been no such thread, though I did start a differently titled other thread

So, given recent events, who's the *******?

[VetLegion]

Originally posted by Ell_man
The text book is, " History of the American Economy 10th edition" by Gary M Walton and Hugh Rockoff.

Eventually I want to read a book about the American economic history. Would you recommend this one?

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by DanS
Here's the table.

http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/poverty/threshld/thresh04.html

$9,645 for one person in a household up to $39,048 for 9. All public assistance, Social Security, etc. counts toward this figure. Capital gains don't count toward it.

Do RRSP (retirement fund) funds count towards that?

How many of the recently retired, but well off, fall into the poverty category?

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Mrs. Tuberski


Most jobs have exhausting and physical efforts. This is not new.

Manual jobs- not most white collar clerical jobs.

Unless you consider commuting to work on public transport exhausting- all those poor people, the smell, the noise, my dear !

American notions of "poverty" disgust me. You guys have no clue what poverty is.

Saras


Well, those of us who haven't been to the developing world can have little experience of absolute poverty- states where there is no safety net of any kind, where if you don't beg or receive charity the consequences can be starvation.

But poverty is relative- as a society develops, certainly as the United Kingdom has changed, the definition of poverty changes too. We no longer have a humiliating stringent means test, most houses have indoor plumbing, a great many have central heating, and yet rickets made a return during Margaret Thatcher's period in power.

And to be fair I'd say that news footage Louisiana showed there is a whole side of the United States that's left out of Disneyland and Disneyworld experiences, and that instead makes its appearances on true-life American cop shows and 'Jerry Springer', complete with bad dentition, obesity and hand-me-down clothes.

And it's no longer British and American children being killed in the workplace, cleaning cotton looms or being stuck in chimney flues, but economic migrant Chinese workers, drowning in the sea off Morecambe, or Russian or Asian women being trafficked across Europe as sex slaves.

Who could have guessed that the brave new world of the 21st Century would have seen a return to the sale of human beings for sex on a gobal scale ?

[Ted Striker]

Originally posted by Saras


Cry me a river.

Sorry stud, you have absolutley no idea what you're talking about.

Of course, you can cry a river for the poor of New Orleans, since, well their city is flooded in a toxic river and now they have nothing.

Thanks CEO

[Ted Striker]

Originally posted by molly bloom


Manual jobs- not most white collar clerical jobs.

Unless you consider commuting to work on public transport exhausting- all those poor people, the smell, the noise, my dear !



Saras


Well, those of us who haven't been to the developing world can have little experience of absolute poverty- states where there is no safety net of any kind, where if you don't beg or receive charity the consequences can be starvation.

But poverty is relative- as a society develops, certainly as the United Kingdom has changed, the definition of poverty changes too. We no longer have a humiliating stringent means test, most houses have indoor plumbing, a great many have central heating, and yet rickets made a return during Margaret Thatcher's period in power.

And to be fair I'd say that news footage Louisiana showed there is a whole side of the United States that's left out of Disneyland and Disneyworld experiences, and that instead makes its appearances on true-life American cop shows and 'Jerry Springer', complete with bad dentition, obesity and hand-me-down clothes.

And it's no longer British and American children being killed in the workplace, cleaning cotton looms or being stuck in chimney flues, but economic migrant Chinese workers, drowning in the sea off Morecambe, or Russian or Asian women being trafficked across Europe as sex slaves.

Who could have guessed that the brave new world of the 21st Century would have seen a return to the sale of human beings for sex on a gobal scale ?

Good post.

[Saras]

Originally posted by Ted Striker
Of course, you can cry a river for the poor of New Orleans, since, well their city is flooded in a toxic river and now they have nothing.

wow. this should make me feel guilty now?

[Patroklos]

Poverty is relative to society I agree, but eventually there has to be a realistic definition of "poor."

So that in America you can be poorer that some, but not poor. We simply need to freeze the poverty line, though it is conforting that Teds numbers are increasing not because people's income is going down, but because the poverty line is going up to adjust for overall prosperity.

I also think that millionares should be taken out of the figuring of the poverty line. If a stock broker rakes in another 25 mil this year and the everyone else stays the same, the poverty line goes up making previous middile class people now "poor" though their actual means have not changed.

[Patroklos]

And you will note Ted, though it doesn't help your rant, that their are myraid middle class people that are completely wiped out to. In a disaster like this, laying waste to everything, your going to get ****ed up no matter what your means.

Though obviously the more money you have the larger the disaster has to be to do this to you.