Jacob Riis’s: Poverty in NYC Jacob Riis was a journalist from the 1800's who aspired to show the upper class the living conditions and lifestyle of the working class. He used photography and technology, modern at the time, to paint a picture of the suffering caused by low wages and high prices, and nailed that metaphorical picture on the metaphorical door of every non metaphorical, wealthy, eccentric high class millionaire in all of New York City. His revolutionary work, and his book, How the Other Half Lives, displayed the widespread oppression of the lower class. Ideas and concepts from Jacob Riis’s “How the Other Half Lives: were not only relevant in 1890, but also have precedence today.…
For this week’s readings, I am going to focus on the issue of growth in cities and what I found interesting in Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City by Matthew Desmond. According to the reading on The City as a Growth Machine by Logan Molotch, “one issue consistently generates consensus among local elite groups and separates them from people who use the city principally as a place to live and work: the issue of growth.” Meaning that the local elites in these cities are divided from those who are not considered elites because of the different ways that these groups grow. The growth of an elite may be drastically different than one who is not an elite. Molotch goes on to say that most of the time elites do not reach their growth…
In “The Three Cities Within Toronto” by J. David Hulchanski, the author asserts that incomes in Toronto’s neighbourhoods and suburbs have become increasingly polarized since 1970 and can be understood as three distinct cities: city #1 comprises the relatively stagnant high-income core, city #2 is the shrinking middle income segment, dispersed throughout Toronto, and city #3 is the growing low income segment which surrounds the core. My field work in the Yonge and Wellesley area and beyond supports and builds upon Hulchanski’s findings; there is strong evidence of income polarization between the site in city #1 to city #2 demonstrated primarily through a change in retail form, decreased access to transportation, and the presence of immigrant…
1. What is the state of Canadians in terms of socioeconomic status? Describe what level of poverty exists in Canada and whether or not you think Canada is fair in terms of distribution of wealth and income. Canada is one of the few countries in the world that is richly endowed with a diversity of natural resources such as natural gas, petroleum and coal. It does have oil reserves estimated to be 183B gallons, making it to be the third largest oil reserve after Saudi Arabia and Venezuela as well as it is the fifth largest oil producer.…
Have you taken a drive into Toronto lately? Homeless people seem to be at practically every street corner either panhandling, squeegeeing, or making beds over warm sidewalk grids. Is our government noticing this? The Province has a homelessness initiative; but, is it really working to help the rapidly growing homeless population in our city.…
A podcast by Maxwell Gladwell, My Little Hundred Million, tells the story of Hank Rowan. Hank Rowan donated 100 million dollars to New Jersey’s Glassboro University in 1992. Rowan’s donation was one of the largest of its kind at the time, he donated to a small college with a middling academic reputation. Gladwell discusses the inequities in financing higher education. In the article, Rethinking American Poverty, by Mark R. Rank, he challenges readers to redefine what causes poverty.…
The homelessness population in Canada ranges from 150,000- 300,000 people. Although there is an estimated number of people that are visibly homeless, this only accounts to the small percentage of actual homeless population. The hidden homeless population in the country who experiences having to live with others or does not have an immediate permanent shelter are growing in numbers.…
The general consensus is that the United States is privileged to enjoy high levels of access to food, shelter, clothing, health care and other resources that help define our country as wealthy. However affluent we may be perceived by developing nations, the United States continues to suffer from economic inequality. Disadvantaged groups and marginalized peoples, within city ghettos and rural areas, experience generalized poverty that is difficult to break away from.…
According to statistics based on the realities of poverty faced in Canada, 1 in 7 (or 4.9 million) people in Canada are living in poverty. Knowing that, the unbecoming power in a capitalist society leaves not just global citizens in poverty, but Canadians also. "The rich get rich and the poor get poorer"- William Henry Harrison. Low income is a root cause to poorer health in Canadians as a whole, especially in terms of poverty 's lethal effects on economic barriers, society 's social norms and the struggle of mental health, faced within the poor in Canada. Economical Barriers differentiating the wealthy and the poor are a major issue.…
In every country, cities, towns and villages there are two groups of people. These two groups are: the affluence and the poor. And depending on our personal and family financial background, we will be classifying in one of the two groups. Unfortunately, we do naturally find ourselves been born from a poor family background which can of course fundamentally change our perspectives and experiences about life. Sometime some unusual situation like being poor and living among affluent class can make us to struggle between both backgrounds.…
Since President Lyndon B. Johnson declared war on poverty in 1964 during his union address, there has been an increase shift in our attention in trying to lower the poverty rate in America. Today, the poverty line depends on how many people live in a household but these thresholds are too low and need to be higher. The poverty line should be a clear distinction that shows that if one is to be below it they cannot afford to pay for the all necessities in order to live. Living above the poverty line, even if it is just above, should mean that one can pay for bills that are necessary to live even if they are just making by doing this. While the poverty line has increased due to inflation in wages, what it has not accounted for is the increase cost in living.…
I agree you that my comment is hard to understand because poverty in a "first world" country still looks like luxury in many "third world" countries. It is a situation that the developed countries' population do not understand because they cannot understand what they don't live; it is not their reality. Even though I wished we should have a right to choose where to live, I understand the need for the U.S, Canada or any other more affluent place to protect their resources and its population. I also understand that there are legal ways to come here; however if I take my country, Brasil, as an example, only the people who is financially and socially stable will receive the American tourist visa. The burocracy is overwhelmed and the money…
However, we clearly see increasing signs that the benefits of urban economies are not disbursed evenly among city residents. Income inequalities continue to increase in cities with a large population, but these discrepancies only tell part of the story.” The authors go on to identify how poverty is ongoing regardless of economic increases and that “economic mobility appears blocked for many urban residents.” They state that “low-income individuals are being left out and overlooked with jobs and schools, thereby, limiting their opportunities for success and “leaving them stuck in poverty for years or even for generations.”…
Why people who are homeless face barrier to the health care? What are the strategies to facilitate the system in health care Canada for homeless adult? Despite the fact that Canada’s health care plan are universal, but there are some barriers that prevent the people who are homeless to access health care. What are the barriers?…
Poverty is an issue that people face in every country of the world. Many people are living in poverty today and unable to live within the same standards as others members of their same society, simply due to differences in their financial capabilities. This is an issue for individuals, as well as an issue between countries, having some countries striving with wealth, while other countries struggle to feed and house their people. A social problem is defined as “a social condition or pattern of behavior that has negative consequences for individuals, our social world, or our physical world” (Guerrero, 2005. 4). This paper was written about the issue poverty because it is an important social problem that affects such a large number of Americans…