More Americans Living in Poverty Now than when Eisenhower was President

[undeterred]

By Stephon Johnson, Special to the NNPA from The Amsterdam News

Let’s add 3.8 million people to the list of impoverished Americans, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Last Thursday, the Bureau released a report that stated that one out of every seven American citizens lived in poverty last year. It’s the highest rate since 1959. It wouldn’t be until 1964 that then President Lyndon B. Johnson would launch his “War on Poverty” initiative.

About 43.6 million people in America lived in poverty in 2009. The poverty rate in 2009 was 14.3 percent, which is an increase from 2008’s rate of 13.2 percent. It’s also the highest level since 1994. The U.S. government classifies an annual income of $21, 756 for a family of four as impoverished. A record high 50.7 million Americans went without health insurance in 2009 amidst the heated debate regarding President Barack Obama’s health care reform.

And according to a couple of analysts, things might not get better until the end of the decade. According to a senior fellow at the Brookings Institute in Washington, Isabel Sawhill, the poverty rate is slated to hit 16 percent and stay at that level during the 2010s. She also came to the conclusion that the poverty club will add 10 million people this decade, which includes 6 million children.

Robert Greenstein also has a similarly dismal outlook for America. The executive director of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities in Washington noted that in the country’s last three recessions, poverty rates don’t decrease until a year after drops in the unemployment rate. As for the numbers concerning New York? They look even bleaker than the rest of the country’s. According to Census Bureau statistics, the poverty rate in New York State rose from 14.2 percent in 2008 to 15.8 percent in 2009, essentially upping the number of people in poverty from 284,000 to just over 3 million. The only time that New York State suffered a poverty jump this high in a 12-month span was from 1989 to 1990.


http://www.blackvoicenews.com/news/news-wire/45038-more-americans-living-in-poverty-now-than-when-eisenhower-was-president.html

[slackmaster]

1. Unrec for the article repeatedly comparing percentages to raw numbers

Of course there are more people living in poverty now than there were in 1959. There are something like 130 million more people.

2010 poor is different than 1959 poor in many respects. Most of the public-funded safety nets we have now simply did not exist in the 1950s.

I feel the cited story is an exercise in "gee whiz" statistics. I don't feel that it taught me anything useful.

[Uncle Joe]

3. The way I read it, the assertion against the 50s statistics isn't raw numbers.

Last Thursday, the Bureau released a report that stated that one out of every seven American citizens lived in poverty last year. It’s the highest rate since 1959. It wouldn’t be until 1964 that then President Lyndon B. Johnson would launch his “War on Poverty” initiative.

[slackmaster]

4. ...which means that the rate was actually higher in 1959 than it is now.

:hi:

[Uncle Joe]

5. Yes but that's not a contradiction to the Title.

Peace to you, slackmaster.:hi:

[diane in sf]

2. The poverty rate is actually higher than reported. It takes a lot more than $22k to

adequately feed, house, clothe, medical service, etc. a family of four. One article I recently read here at DU estimates that 77% of the people in the US are now one paycheck away from disaster.