Modern Poverty Includes AC and X-Box

[Dusty]

lol I'd be poor, too, if I could afford an X-box...

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner...x-ken-mcintyre

When Americans think of poverty, we tend to picture people who can’t adequately shelter, clothe, and feed themselves or their families.

When the Census Bureau defines “poverty,” though, it winds up painting more than 40 million Americans — one in seven — as “poor.”

Census officials continue to grossly exaggerate the numbers of the poor, creating a false picture in the public mind of widespread material deprivation, writes Heritage Foundation senior research fellow Robert Rector in a new paper.

“Most news stories on poverty feature homeless families, people living in crumbling shacks, or lines of the downtrodden eating in soup kitchens,” Rector says. “The actual living conditions of America’s poor are far different from these images.”

Congress is tying itself in knots figuring out how to cut spending and bring down a $14 trillion national debt. Lawmakers might well take a much closer look at the nearly a trillion dollars spent each year on welfare even though many recipients aren’t what the typical American would recognize as poor and in need of government assistance.

What is poverty? Americans might well be surprised to learn from other government data that the overwhelming majority of those defined as “poor” by the Census Bureau were well-housed and adequately fed even in the recession year 2009. About 4 percent of them did temporarily become homeless.

Data from the Department of Energy and other agencies show that the average poor family, as defined by Census officials:

● Lives in a home that is in good repair, not crowded, and equipped with air conditioning, clothes washer and dryer, and cable or satellite TV service.

● Prepares meals in a kitchen with a refrigerator, coffee maker and microwave as well as oven and stove.

● Enjoys two color TVs, a DVD player, VCR and — if children are there — an Xbox, PlayStation, or other video game system.

● Had enough money in the past year to meet essential needs, including adequate food and medical care.

Rather than report such detailed surveys, Rector and co-author Rachel Sheffield write, the media “amplified” the Census Bureau’s annual misrepresentation of poverty over the past 40 years. News reports routinely suggest that poor Americans typically are homeless and hungry — and U.S. foes and rivals such as Iran, China, and Russia are delighted to report the same.

“Regrettably, most discussions of poverty in the U.S. rely on sensationalism, exaggeration, and misinformation,” Rector says. “But an effective anti-poverty policy must be based on an accurate assessment of actual living conditions and the causes of deprivation.”

[PedOncoDoc]

I recall seeing an alarming number of new Cadillac Escalades, Lincoln Navigators, etc., when driving through the housing projects and poor areas of Cleveland. I recall having a few of the "poor" laughing at my ride when pulled up beside them.

Clearly a significant number of the "poor" have more expendible income than I do.

[Pete]

Originally Posted by PedOncoDoc

I recall seeing an alarming number of new Cadillac Escalades, Lincoln Navigators, etc., when driving through the housing projects and poor areas of Cleveland. I recall having a few of the "poor" laughing at my ride when pulled up beside them.

Clearly a significant number of the "poor" have more expendible income than I do.

Our local Food Lion is a pretty busy place. Lots of EBT Card users.

I've made it a game to spot the EBT Card users and see what kind of ride they get into. Some do have shabby rides but I'd say the majority have rides much better then my own.

[greenberetTFS]

What bugged me when I went to Walmart recently is the lady in front of me who was using her EBT Card for her food,I noticed her 3 boys wearing Michael Jordan track shoes.....

Big Teddy

[Sigaba]

MOO, the full report, available here, does not make a convincing case regarding the so called MSM presentation of poverty or the public perception of poverty. The report could have addressed the latter by interviewing a representative sample of the man and the woman on the street and/or by exploring how poverty is discussed in mass popular culture or in serious studies of the issue. (American social historians, especially those who focus on the working classes and urban areas, often look at upward mobility as a key indicator of poverty.*)

The report could have addressed better MSM coverage of poverty with a much wider sample of news reports across media (that is, print and radio as well as television). Instead, the report comes across as anecdotal when discussing this important point.

As for the central contention that data do not in and of themselves provide a complete picture--this proposition is hardly new.

__________________________________________________ __
* The work that pioneered this approach is Stephen Thernstrom, Poverty and Progress: Social Mobility in a Nineteenth Century City, Joint Center for Urban Studies (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1980).

[Groleck]

When I was a teenager I worked in a grocery store and it bothered me when an EBT user strolled up to my cash register with all brand name groceries, oftentimes organic and costing twice as much. Others would appear with 12 packs of beer (in the bottle of course, cans are for poor people) and purchase the "healthier" (more expensive) cigarettes with the EBT card and then ask for cash back.

I knew that if I multiplied my hourly wage by 40 hours and subtracted x percentage that these people were still taking in more money than I was by sucking the gov't ***.

I live on my own while attending college full-time and don't meet some of those "poverty" standards. And I thought my living arrangements were pretty comfortable, especially when I read what SF and other combat arms men live with on deployment.

[rdret1]

It aggravates the crap out of me when I go to a residence for whatever reason and find a young "man" on disability that is physically as capable, or more so, than I am. Then you see they are living in Section 8 housing; have EBT cards; a 50" HDTV; a new SUV with rims, head rest video screens all around and a speaker as big as a steamer trunk; and a decked out crotch rocket. Then you arrest them for warrants or something else, the magistrate gives them a $2000 bond and they whip it out of their back pocket like it was nothing. Happens more often than most people would think.

[Barbarian]

I would estimate that 30% of the local populace, here in my AO, draws some sort of tax funded income. Most of these live in "single-wide" trailors, which sport a satellite TV dish. Beside the trailor generally sits some form of ATV. Often times it's a $16,000 polaris razor or some such.

Did you know that people on welfare actually get free cell phones now?!?! Just found that out the other day.

No damn wonder that our national deficit has become so large.

[BOfH]

I live near an infamous NYC project, it was actually considered the worst in the five boroughs for some time. Man, you should see some of the cars parked in front of this place, along with their PA plates so they don't have pay NYC auto insurance rates on their 'Benz