America clocked up a record last week. The latest drop in house prices meant that the cost of real estate has fallen by 33% since the peak – even bigger than the 31% slide seen when John Steinbeck was writing The Grapes of Wrath.
Unemployment has not returned to Great Depression levels but at 9.1% of the workforce it is still at levels that will have nerves jangling in the White House. The last president to be re-elected with unemployment above 7.2% was Franklin Delano Roosevelt.
The US is a country with serious problems. Getting on for one in six depend on government food stamps to ensure they have enough to eat. The budget, which was in surplus little more than a decade ago, now has a deficit of Greek-style proportions. There is policy paralysis in Washington.
The assumption is that the problems can be easily solved because the US is the biggest economy on the planet, the only country with global military reach, the lucky possessor of the world's reserve currency, and a nation with a proud record of re-inventing itself once in every generation or so.
More Here..Unemployment has not returned to Great Depression levels but at 9.1% of the workforce it is still at levels that will have nerves jangling in the White House. The last president to be re-elected with unemployment above 7.2% was Franklin Delano Roosevelt.
The US is a country with serious problems. Getting on for one in six depend on government food stamps to ensure they have enough to eat. The budget, which was in surplus little more than a decade ago, now has a deficit of Greek-style proportions. There is policy paralysis in Washington.
The assumption is that the problems can be easily solved because the US is the biggest economy on the planet, the only country with global military reach, the lucky possessor of the world's reserve currency, and a nation with a proud record of re-inventing itself once in every generation or so.
"Getting on for one in six depend on government food stamps to ensure they have enough to eat."
ReplyDeleteNo. Both points are inaccurate presented in that single sentence.
44 million food stamps for each HOUSE! That makes the total number of Americans on them close to 50%, which of course is 1 out of 2 (3 out of 6). Can we please get this corrected for anyone writing about this in future articles?
Only one person per property can be on food stamps. So it applies for the entire family or group living there. And today it is uncommon for someone to support themselves financially if they live alone. There is also a massive portion of Americans that are too young or too old to take care of themselves.
Second fallacy is that these people on food stamps do not require them for food. They only supplement their ability to make a living. For those who work and use them, it doesn't mean they will run out of food if they went off of them. It just means they won't get things like bread and cereal and therefore they'd have to pay for it which would furnish them with a slightly heavier burden.
Depending on your income, you get only a certain amount of "free food" each month. And you're not allowed to get stuff like candy or lobster...
There are people who are not on food stamps that are worse off than those on them. Tell me you enjoy working 100 hours a week so you can be proud of yourself and complain about those on government assistance? That mostly applies to the Glenn Beck - Tea Party fuckers.