One in five American kids was living in poverty in 2009. Across the country, once solidly middle-class families are lining up at food pantries and soup kitchens for groceries or a hot meal. In New York City, a startling indicator of the continuing economic stress is the rise in the number of homes that don’t have kitchens.
Election Day is approaching, but neither party cares to focus on the nightmare facing millions of Americans who have been laid low by unemployment, home foreclosures, personal bankruptcies, and jobs that offer only part-time work, lousy pay and absolutely no benefits.
In an era of extreme economic inequality (which is another way of saying economic unfairness), Wall Street can be on a roll and corporate profits can streak toward the moon at the same time that ordinary American families are stuck in depressionlike conditions with precious little hope of relief.
The Democrats are trying to put the best possible face on this terrible economic reality, imploring voters to give them a little credit for preventing matters from becoming much worse. No matter how valid, that’s a tough case to make to families whose properties are being plastered with foreclosure notices. Or to the breadwinners whose 99 weeks of unemployment insurance have been exhausted without anything in the way of a decent job materializing. Or the former middle managers now working for peanuts at Home Depot or Wal-Mart.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/02/opinion/02herbert.html?th&emc=th
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