Posted on 04/08/2014 7:11:28 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
A major concern of progressives is their supposed interest in the fate of the poor. They purport to be the champions of the poor. But the truth is that they need the poor more than the poor need them, in a symbiotic relationship. As much as 75% of the money allocated to the poor is consumed by the vast bureaucracies that administer this aid.
[SNIP]
What is poverty? The late political scientist Edward Banfield provided four degrees of poverty: destitution, which is lack of income sufficient to assure physical survival and to prevent suffering from hunger, exposure, or remediable or preventable illness; want, which is lack of enough income to support essential welfare; hardship, which is lack of enough to prevent acute persistent discomfort or inconvenience. To this he added a fourth: relative deprivation which is a lack of enough income, status, or whatever else may be valued to prevent one from feeling poor in comparison to others. This last category is elastic enough to include millionaires who covet the possessions and power of billionaires. One important category of poverty Banfield does not mention is psychological or spiritual poverty. This is the most significant form of poverty in an affluent society when physical needs are easily met.
Where do America's "poor" stand in this scale of poverty? In a nation of over 300 million people there are undoubtedly cases of destitution, want and hardship. However, these cases appear to be the exception. As former Secretary of Agriculture Dan Glickman stated, "More people die in the United States of too much food than of too little." According to William Bennett, "Poor people in America have a higher standard of living than middle-class Americans of previous generations."
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
Therein lies the rub.
All Liberals have to do when they want to increase social spending (which is constantly) is change the definition.
Voila - numbers increase!
Want to use the number of "poor" to bolster your argument?
Change the definition of "poor".
RE: All Liberals have to do when they want to increase social spending (which is constantly) is change the definition.
So, not having a cell phone is poor? Therefore, everyone has a right to an Obamaphone?
There are no poor in this country, only those who have less than others.
You want poor? Go to Haiti.
“Poverty” in the U.S. means qualifying for food stamp, rent subsidy, free health care, free lunches at school, free job training, etc. while you have a flat screen TV with cable, beer in the frog, and can afford cigarettes and trips to the nail salon.
This week in Austin, TX they will be celebrating LBJ’s “War on Poverty, “ which was obviously lost because there are more “Poor” than ever, thanks to LBJ and Obama.
We had a speaker come speak to our Kiwanis chapter about giving money to support a program to send food home with students on weekends. The speaker told us “These kids don’t have food at home and may not get to eat if we don’t send this food”.
My hand shot up. “If these kids are being neglected that badly, shouldn’t Social Services step in?”.
Crickets....
We are giving them food so they can spend that money on cigarettes
There are NO poor in America ... imo.
There is food enough, programs enough to buy/provide food ... there is housing available for everyone that needs it and there's money available.
Truthfully, the housing sucks, the food is crap and the money is little, but I could board myself up in a project and eat, be warm and sheltered, watch TV and wither away and die of old age (free health care comes with the deal), and I'll hate my life every day .... but I would not be "poor"
And if I was smart (and I like to think I am), Ill figure a way OUT of that forsaken lifestyle and better myself.
Then why are there people still in the bottom quintile, huh, smart guy? Do you think that’s fair?
(/libthink /sarc)
Poverty in the USA = lack of manners, lack of a work ethic, lack of class
When you add up all the free stuff they get the poor are better off than someone that works and makes just enough to not qualify for free stuff.
The whole America-Is-Hungry campaign to me is a gigantic fraud. Where I live, western Wisconsin, we are constantly subjected to ads for programs to “feed the hungry.” And I always exclaim to the tv set, WHERE????? Where are these hungry, starving people? They sure aren’t anywhere where I go. Just walk through the local Walmarts and try to find these starving people. You’ll see quite the opposite and get the impression a very large pct. of the local population should go a long diet.
The bottom quintile you will always have with you.
Paraphrasing Jesus, speaking to a crowd of statisticians...
Many Mexican immigrants have a sixth or eighth grade education because high school costs money that they don’t have.
Here, education through 12th grade is free and college is subsidized for many.
Not only that, we have very low unemployment, here.
You don’t need to look in Walmart. I see overflowing carts in Woodman’s, as well, paid for with the debit card. I see very little fresh food in those carts. Now, I know self-supporting folks who put everything on a card for the airfare points, so using a debit card doesn’t mean it’s welfare.
I’d say from informal observation, that 1/3 of of the folks I see on the street here are just genetically programmed to be hefty. At the moment, we have a good friend, educated, eats right, exercises, but cannot get his weight down to where he wants it. His sibling has no problem with weight loss. I think it just depends on what combo of genes you inherit.
IN the USA, by definition, “Poverty” is a constant: The lower 20% of all incomes.
Doesn’t matter what you have, how well you live, etc. If you are in the lower 20% of US incomes, you are in “poverty.”
Here they keep running some kind of give to insure children get milk at home. I thought WIC took care of that.....and food stamps.
I already gave to those programs.
Thanks for posting. I think I will save this.
I probably have been in the “hardship” category for most of the past 18 years. I certainly have not been in the”destitute” category and not in the “want” category enough to say so.
For legal purposes, such as bankruptcy hearings, though, the word destitute may be used, so I think there will be widely different definitions. My term for the bottom two is “grinding poverty”, that is, third world type poverty.
I don’t presently have a vehicle, cable or satellite TV or radio or a digital TV. Most of the electronics I have are hand-me-downs. I have a cheap DVD player I got when I was working briefly at a well paying job.
This morning on the John Carlson show they were talking about unionization of college athletes. This one kid was saying he went to bed hungry some nights. There has to be something wrong with that picture. I had to leave to catch a bus so didnt best the end of it.
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