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Wednesday, September 14th, 2011

Census: US Poverty Rate Swells to Nearly 1 in 6

Author:     HOPE YEN
Source:     The Associated Press
Publication Date:     13-Sep-11
 Link: Census: US Poverty Rate Swells to Nearly 1 in 6
Stephan:   Twenty two per cent of children in the United States live in poverty; the largest percentage of any industrialized nation in the world. How can anybody live with that? The economic and war policies we have followed in the post-Clinton years, Republican and Democrat alike, have proven a disaster. You have to be in thrall to ideology to want to continue them. They are a nightmare that will never end until we change to rational humane national and international policies and programs. We are suffering from a national bout of insanity, and self-destruction. The election of 2012 is going to determine whether we return to being a country or continue as an asylum. I cannot get over these figures, and what they say about our national character. I guess I should not be surprised given the cheering the other night when it was noted that Gov. Perry had put to death 234 people. Those cheering I hope to God do not represent America. Because if they do, we're not a society, we're a mob.

WASHINGTON — The ranks of U.S. poor swelled to nearly 1 in 6 people last year, reaching a new high as long-term unemployment woes left millions of Americans struggling and out of work. The number of uninsured edged up to 49.9 million, the biggest in over two decades.

The Census Bureau’s annual report released Tuesday offers a snapshot of the economic well-being of U.S. households for 2010, when joblessness hovered above 9 percent for a second year. It comes at a politically sensitive time for President Barack Obama, who has acknowledged in the midst of his re-election fight that the unemployment rate could persist at high levels through next year.

The overall poverty rate climbed to 15.1 percent, or 46.2 million, up from 14.3 percent in 2009.

Reflecting the lingering impact of the recession, the U.S. poverty rate from 2007-2010 has now risen faster than any three-year period since the early 1980s, when a crippling energy crisis amid government cutbacks contributed to inflation, spiraling interest rates and unemployment.

Measured by total numbers, the 46 million now living in poverty is the largest on record dating back to when the census began tracking poverty in 1959. Based on percentages, it tied the poverty level in […]

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