The rich get richer and the poor get poorer

  • December 26, 2011 22:12

Capitalism is functional, but for whom? For riches, surely not for poor. In 1982 there were 13 billionaires in the USA, in 1983…15; in 1984…12; in 1985…13; in 1986…26; in 1987…49…By 1989, the number had risen precipitously to 82. And by 1990, the Forbes survey reported the staggering total of 99. The Hurun Rich List 2011 contains 271 Chinese people with fortunes over $1 billion, an increase of more than 40 percent from last year. The 271 dollar billionaires have more than doubled in number since being only 130 in 2009. The 2010 edition of Forbes 400 Richest Americans found 385 billionaires in the US. The richest 1% own virtually all of the media, and have little difficulty controlling the content and coloration of television and newspaper information reaching the public. Facts that would have exposed the true nature of present day America rarely get presented through newspapers or television. Instead, they surface in magazines such as the Economist, Forbes, Fortune, Insight, and The Wall Street Journal which are read almost exclusively by the economic elite and their sympathizers.
For many families in the United States, this Christmas they were not spending at home. No, they are not off at a beach resort or on a skiing vacation. An ever-rising number of American children is spending Christmas on the streets, in a shelter, in their car, or in a cheap motel that they may no longer be able to afford tomorrow. Child homelessness in the United States has increased 38 percent since 2007 and last year there were 1.6 million homeless children in the country.
It is clear that powerful and “richest nation” America is powerful for riches and not for poor. Poor people have no profit from war and military industry, trillions of Dollars are spent for war and war industry and for spying and after all that stupid spending, there are 1,6 million children homeless. In a report issued earlier this month, the National Center on Family Homelessness, based in Needham, Massachusetts, said 1.6 million children were living on the streets of the United States last year or in shelters, motels and doubled-up with other families. That marked a 38 percent jump in child homelessness since 2007. The data showed also that about 48 percent of Americans are living in poverty or on low incomes. The poverty level for a family of four was set at income anywhere below $24,343 per year. A lot of children are dependent on poverty-stricken single moms. Highlighting the shrinking middle class in America, a reporter found Tracy and Elizabeth Burger and their 8-year-old son, Dylan. The Burgers said they once earned nearly $100,000 a year combined but saw their middle-class lifestyle evaporate when Tracy lost his job in audiovisual system sales. Unable to pay rent, they were evicted from their apartment in early 2009 and had to move into a motel. In March they moved into a cramped converted garage at Elizabeth’s mother’s house in Los Angeles. Here is a video from Seattle.

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