Pride and Prejudice:
Current Economic Inequality and America’s Poor Attitude
Once America was touted land of opportunity, a place where hard work, dedication and smarts could launch you from rags to riches. If one worked hard enough, they could have a plentiful life of wealth and happiness. Unless you are born affluent, we cannot argue this as easily conceivable possibility any longer. CEO’s have record high salaries and profit margins. Unemployment is down. This is only part of the story. Unemployment is down, but so are salaries for those not at the very top. Despite record profits, benefits for low-end works continue to decline. The highest wrung continues to CBS, NPR, Huffington post is just a few of those talking about our dwindling middle …show more content…
The middle class has shrunk so much as to be almost non-existent. Arriving with the slow elimination of the middle class is a new class below the poverty line the “criminal” class. The wage gap is rising even with unemployment dropping. Wages at lower tiers are dropping while the highest rise even higher. Social mobility is the lowest it has ever been. These facts combined have created what Citi group calls an “hourglass economy”, where there is only the very rich or the very poor and the middle class is marginal or non-existent. Every day we come closer to this being the true American …show more content…
Currently in the media, you see a lot of blame placed on poor adults for their situation; Poor Kids shines light on the fallacy of this argument. Even the most conservative pundit cannot blame kids. You cannot say that a child, “didn’t try hard enough to get a job” or “they never tried to get a degree.” This documentary brings the emotional aspect of some otherwise empirical concepts. Critics of programs such as food stamps love to tell anecdotal stories of the “undeserving” the supposed hordes of those that abuse welfare and food stamps, ignorant of the real data. Reports in 2012 stated nearly half (45%) of the recipients of food stamps are children, 10% are persons over the working age of 60, another 10% are disabled adults and the remaining 35% usually are households with one working adult that is not making enough money to feed their children without help. These Kids also punished for being poor if they still have remnants of a life before poverty such as video game consoles or new phones. Political pundits and legislators alike harp of an anecdotal public eye, Americans look down on someone with an iPhone if they are using food stamps. Apparently unable to fathom it could have been a gift from a relative or a refurbished Christmas gift gotten by careful scrimping and saving of
Current Economic Inequality and America’s Poor Attitude
Once America was touted land of opportunity, a place where hard work, dedication and smarts could launch you from rags to riches. If one worked hard enough, they could have a plentiful life of wealth and happiness. Unless you are born affluent, we cannot argue this as easily conceivable possibility any longer. CEO’s have record high salaries and profit margins. Unemployment is down. This is only part of the story. Unemployment is down, but so are salaries for those not at the very top. Despite record profits, benefits for low-end works continue to decline. The highest wrung continues to CBS, NPR, Huffington post is just a few of those talking about our dwindling middle …show more content…
The middle class has shrunk so much as to be almost non-existent. Arriving with the slow elimination of the middle class is a new class below the poverty line the “criminal” class. The wage gap is rising even with unemployment dropping. Wages at lower tiers are dropping while the highest rise even higher. Social mobility is the lowest it has ever been. These facts combined have created what Citi group calls an “hourglass economy”, where there is only the very rich or the very poor and the middle class is marginal or non-existent. Every day we come closer to this being the true American …show more content…
Currently in the media, you see a lot of blame placed on poor adults for their situation; Poor Kids shines light on the fallacy of this argument. Even the most conservative pundit cannot blame kids. You cannot say that a child, “didn’t try hard enough to get a job” or “they never tried to get a degree.” This documentary brings the emotional aspect of some otherwise empirical concepts. Critics of programs such as food stamps love to tell anecdotal stories of the “undeserving” the supposed hordes of those that abuse welfare and food stamps, ignorant of the real data. Reports in 2012 stated nearly half (45%) of the recipients of food stamps are children, 10% are persons over the working age of 60, another 10% are disabled adults and the remaining 35% usually are households with one working adult that is not making enough money to feed their children without help. These Kids also punished for being poor if they still have remnants of a life before poverty such as video game consoles or new phones. Political pundits and legislators alike harp of an anecdotal public eye, Americans look down on someone with an iPhone if they are using food stamps. Apparently unable to fathom it could have been a gift from a relative or a refurbished Christmas gift gotten by careful scrimping and saving of