Poverty Data Indicate No Real Income Growth Since 1970s

The New Yorker:

The latest poverty and income figures came out this week, and boy are they disturbing. It’s not so much the headline figures, which have been well covered in the Times and elsewhere: 46 million Americans living under the poverty line in 2010, the highest number since the Commerce Department started collecting the figures back in 1959. That’s a horrible statistic. (Amy Davidson responded on Tuesday.) But it’s not too surprising since we’ve been through the deepest recession since the nineteen-thirties, and getting thrown out of work is a primary cause of poverty. (Plus, the population grows every year. If the proportion of people in poverty stays the same, you’d expect the absolute numbers to grow over time.)

Read the whole story: The New Yorker

Comments

[vobox3343]

11:49 AM on 09/16/2011

It's only a surprise to greedy Republicans who continually tell you trickle down economics works. Who are the idiots who keep voting for them. Display their photos, we need to see who they are.

[desertman]

03:27 PM on 09/16/2011

Dial back the screed a bit. It seems we are in good company. Check the poverty levels in Europe. Europe... that socialist paradise remember? You might be surprised.

[greyhound2]

07:25 PM on 09/15/2011

And those who claim that inflation is low haven't been to the grocery store in months.

[desertman]

03:28 PM on 09/16/2011

Gas and food are not included in the inflation number. That makes sense right?

[brian mcnary]

06:58 PM on 09/15/2011

...and this surprises who?

You cannot fund gawd knows how many social programs via taxes, throw in a few worthless wars, and then think that your disposable income will go up. My true effective tax rate, federal, state, property tax, sales tax, etc is nearly 55%. Government services I cannot avoid, water, sewer, trash, vehicle registration, amounts to another 100 bucks a mo.

It is insanity. It has to end soon or we will end as a country. Personally, I hope the economic implosion occurs soon. I've never been good with slow, drawn out and agonizing deaths.