Recession Creating Legions Of Newly Homeless

Washington Post:

The ravages of the recession, including a surge in foreclosures and unemployment approaching 10 percent, have driven thousands of families onto the streets.

Although the number of homeless individuals remained relatively stable between 2007 and 2008, the number of homeless families rose 9 percent, and in rural and suburban areas the number jumped a staggering 56 percent, according to a report released last week by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development

Read the whole story: Washington Post

Comments

[MIKEBC]

Is that a line for one of the new Bushvilles? after the last 8 years of rightwing conservative economic policies, that picture shows some conservative prosperity.

[lillibelle]

Imagine being homeless in sub-zero Wyoming. The stimulus package was supposed to bring jobs to American workers but continues to wind up as corporate bonuses while the derivative demons walk away, scot free. What a sorry mess. Maybe Ross Perot was right when he warned that NAFTA would wipe away American jobs.

[nelilio]

Hi,
stimulus package = corporate bonuses ?
Please specify, some examples please.
Thanks,
NL

[sueinmn]

WTO created 50 million jobs.!!!!!


NOT IN THE USA.

[Roguewolf]

Big Brother Barry says I saved those jobs.

[SCG]

What should we name the growing homeless encampments?

Greenspanvilles?
Friedmanvilles?
Bushvilles?
Summer's innovation ville?
Bernanketown?
Clinton's bridge to 21st nowhereville?

[Kassandra]

My guess is they will be named Obamavilles..... unfair, maybe, but he's the president and he's done nearly everything Hoover did before FDR got in a s president.

[macohmz]

Good question. Seeing as how there were so many invoved in the construction of these encampments. "Venalityville" is what I call them.

[MIKEBC]

8 years of rightwing economics = our bridge back to the late 1920's

[Henk]

More like 25 years. St. Ronny Reagan started a lot of this when he set about closing down state run paychiatric institutions.

[jane gutowski]

Unfortunately the people in charge have no idea what they are doing. We have the same ones still running things that got us into this mess like Summers and Geithner and Barney Frank is up to his old tricks of convincing banks to let people buy houses they know in advance they cant pay for.And the rich who we bailed out are giving out million dollar bonuses.And congress is throwing our money away on pork like billion dollar turtle crossings instead of using that money to shelter the growing homeless.

[twistedknickers]

Did you get your GOP tax break?

[MIKEBC]

For the ones in that picture; how's those GOP tax breaks working out?

[Jason Abdon]

The people in charge are supposed to be the American electorate. But it seems that the three G's are more important than actually solving a social or economic problems. (The three G's, for those of you who aren't to well informed are no Gays, Guns for everybody, and God on every corner until it come out you nose and ears.)

Number one, you have to stop thinking in this left right stupidity. Think instead of the those who have the gold make the rules or ignore the rules as they see fit.
And with apologies to Mr. Murphy, it will have to be Mr. Smith and Mr. Wesson who will trump gold and make new rules.
Hopefully, it will not be this way. Greed is starting to trump reason and everything else. When we come to this point there's only one thing left to do.

[williamina]

weird

[Henk]

Yup, there was an organized group of poor people, lead by Frank , scouring the country looking for poor unsuppecting bankers. When they found them they swarmed that office and took out loans for overpriced houses in the hood. All with an eye toward bringing down the world economy. These homeless, near homeless, black, white, hispanic, uneducated, jobless or low wage earners duped the smartest players on Wall Street and trading markets across the globe. It has been without a doubt the most successfull campaign in the history of the world.

[TXfemmom]

Okay, our priorities are screwed up. For the price of ONE of those fighters Obama and the military say we don't need, but Lockheed Martin is trying to get Congress to continue, could provide single room residences which are safe, clean and a means to provide stability for all these homeless families. Sooner or later, we have to stop spending more on defense than the rest of the world together.

We spend $100 million a day to protect the Gulf for Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Kuwait. Just tell them that if they want protection, they pay. That is simple enough. We could provide housing and assistance to all those who need it on $100 million a day.

[samjung23]

AMEN! When will this ignorance stop?

[xrepublican]

It'll stop ONLY when political contributions - big $$$ from big business - don't drive governmental priorities and policies.

We're in BIZZAROLAND - this is the DIRECT result of Bush's 'Ownership Society' - record levels of foreclosures and homelessness with TRILLIONS going to big business while people are thrown on the street without any government help.

[Kassandra]

Well, and McCrystal is demanding BILLIONS more for Afghanistan...didn't we see THIS one coming?

[ShakeYourComplacency]

The difference between poverty in this country and poverty in other countries is that here, don't admit we have it. People in other countries knew they had a problem, and they knew why - their government. Russians didn't cram in little apartments because they were clueless. They knew it was the result of a corrupt system.

Us? We ignore it. And we manage no matter what it takes. We shop in box stores, clip coupons, eat off the McDonald's dollar menu, and live off credit. Anything to keep the facade going. We actually think we got it good. Children are starving in China, remember that one? Well things have certainly changed. China is booming, Russia has oil and a growing economy, while we're all working 2 or 3 jobs to pay the bills.

I grew up in the freaking middle class. Where is it??? Where did it go? Where did the jobs go, the quality products that didn't break 2 weeks later, the food that wasn't recalled? My father's 3 story brand new house cost 50K and he bought it and supported us with a middle management job. He didn't have an MBA, he was a regular guy.

[IndelibleVoice]

Sadly, that America is gone for now. Fanned BTW.

[xrepublican]

Was it worth losing the US middle class so you can buy $600 flat screen HDTV's?

Seems to me the US was better off when we all had a little LESS 'stuff' (and it lasted far longer even if it cost more) .

[michael d]

I identify with your remarks concerning your father.

I remember a conversation I had with my father concerning how each generation was suppose to build off success of the previous one... a little nicer house, bigger car, better job, etc. He wondered how long that would be possible. I need to call him this week to tell him.

btw-fanned

[samjung23]

I think it's the growing pains of America. Stupid people had their chance and blew it. Time for us to ignore them and put our stars out to shine. We won't be the sham powerful nation we used to be, but at least we'll be respected and run this nation half-decently.

[Kassandra]

Most have forgotten or weren't born during the times you speak of. My father was a common laborer for the Railroads, loading sacks of mail on the trains. He had a Railroad retirement pension and a super healthcare package.
My mother eventually went back to work in the 50's for a local department store chain as a hair stylist. SHE had profit-sharing, a pension AND a super healthcare plan.
We were lower middle class and had a small house which my folks bought for $10,000 in a VERY nice part of town.

People seem to think these days that all of the take down of America and the strategies which accomplished it have been here forever and maybe they have, I think the start of it was the Great Depression. I think the gov got real scared of an educated populace after the civil disobedience of the 60's-70's and started to work on US.

It;'s been a slow grind since Reagan with his 'deficits don't matter" and "trickle down"over spending to bring the paper tiger of the Soviet Union to heel. Who's "to heel" now?

Well, now it seems everyone in the world is better off than America is.

Bondard Stuart opined on Welldon's radio show that America will have a permanent under class unless we #1 get health insurance off our backs and #2 create jobs thru green technology. In other words, we must have a new thing, like in the 90's we had the internet.

[Kassandra]

And does it seem to you that Obama and this Congress is going to do those things??? It doesn't to me, the way we've been having to fight them every step of the way.

[nelilio]

I distinctly remember Mr. Obama saying that he was going to need our help -- that he couldn't do it alone (of, by, and for, hmm?). The so called loyal opposition has got the pattern we need to start following if the mandate we gave him back in November is ever to be achieved, IMHO. Like your post above, BTW, but you forgot Raygun's union-busting.

[Alexander Hamilton]

Nero-Bama is completely responsible for each unemployed person, because every single Obamination policy has failed.

[BannedInBoston]

Oh, please.

[IndelibleVoice]

I think you mean Dubya's ne.o-co.n trickle-down policies have failed.

[abbyrose86]

You aren't very intelligent, are you?

[abbyrose86]

My last post, was for Alexander Hamilton, but it linked to the wrong post. so sorry.

[hark]

No, no. These people are all lazy louts, losers, devoid of individual responsibility, looking for handouts, holding fiercely to their government blankies, sucking their thumbs, waiting for somebody to take care of them.

You've forgotten your lessons. It can't be Obama's fault.

We have individual responsibility in this country. We are all self-sufficient, dependent upon no one except God and Jesus.

[Jason Abdon]

Part of the problem is God and Jesus Allah or whatever fanaticism.

[rollingdivision]

These newly homeless are really just so out of touch....They should stop complaining Obama says the stimulus is working.

[Sezwho]

It's not about Obama, Bush, or Rep, or Dem,. Their the same gang, different jerseys.

[rollingdivision]

Obama and his $1,000,000,000,000 stimulus are failing the people.

[Jason Abdon]

You got dat' right.

[Sezwho]

Imagine the crumbling of once major cities, for example Detroit, and St. Louis, they have been deteriorating for decades now. Once major U.S. corporations expanded globally from cheap labor, and laws favorable to them, America has become a thorn in its side, and slowly but surely these companies will get their way. And that's how America will crumble.

[rollingdivision]

It would make sense to become a place where companies want to do business and expand.

[Sezwho]

"Business" pay slave wages, work your employees long hours, little or no health coverage, outsource job to a third world country... increase profits every quarter for investors,....seemed to work out great for the U.S. don't you think

[Prattvictory2]

The American worker has to compete against slaves in third world countries. People who drink dirty water breathe dirty air. When the complain about their conditions the police show up and the organizers are taken away never to be seen again.

This is our future.

[dbg2]

Not my future. I will go down fighting for a fair and just economy. F..k corporate America. Lets get it on.

[abbyrose86]

Yes, DECADES. Thank you. This has been going on for decades. Our current economic policies aren't working for the MAJORITY of Americans. Why is it so hard for people to see what is so clearly in front of their eyes?

[BadHaBritt]

STOP THE POLITICAL CRAP.
People are suffering very badly and most of it is NOT their fault.
Democrats Republicans, it makes no difference, there is still a lot of money in the hands of the few. Now is the time to see who will measure up to the real task of saving the people F**k the elite that caused this mess, MAKE them help to solve it, tax the hell out of them, make them feel a some pain as well.
They should be made to see the problems with their own eyes and stop hiding behind the're financial walls.

[abbyrose86]

The sad part is they don't care. And you are right, the only way to make them care, is if they feel it. History has shown us that time and again.

[IndelibleVoice]

The architects of this recession should be required to shelter it's victims (or at least cover the costs to retrain them for the remaining middle-class jobs we have in the U.S.).

[samjung23]

Well, even Republicans realize the error of their ways when they go broke. Just sit back and wait folks, and we'll hear the complaining soon enough! Their system is doomed to fail, one way or the other.

[williamina]

yeah and your system always fails the same way

[lysistrata]

Is there any information about the number of homeless families with children available from any socialist Western European state, Scandinavian nations, Germany, France, Switzerland, Austria, or any other nation? The list here shows the real big increases in red states.

[1088]

A lot of Republicant states are not helping the people with the stimulus money, because they want the President to fail.

[deadcustodian]

Yes 1088 you are right.

Hey everybody welcome to the BUSH DEPRESSION.

Thanks for nothing RethugliKKKants.

[Jason Abdon]

Here, here. Three raspberries and a Bronx cheer for the repiglecans.

[hark]

The government could create a pubic works project to develop alternative energy for the 21st century century and put all these people to work. They could put everyone to work during every recession, too. There are all kinds of things society could do so people don't have to wallow in misery waiting for the capitalists to hire them again.

But we won't do a thing. Nope. That would be socialism.

[SamKnause]

Hear Hear!!!