thomasfromtacoma,
Why is it that you choose to call people names?

Thinker 2 and the other members were only trying to elucidate a few thoughts on why such a statistic exits in a country like the U.S. which seems to pride itself on its record of human rights.

You would do well not to take these sort of criticisms personally - every country has its pluses and minuses - America is no different in that sense.

Sure I am all for common sense and logical and provable information, not personal bias and prejudice veiled by falsely presenting information that the gullible readily eat up.
If you want me to refute every inconceivable supposed fact I would be forever posting to this article. I shall not post until there is a t least spark of intelligence presented , not the absolute crap you ossies want pretend is factual.

thomasfromtacoma,

Like I said been there done that I've been there a 5 times for longer than a week or two. I've actually been to most of those places I mentioned. Reuters is hardly a BS organization and neither would their figures.
Albeit a few years ago but my son has been there 3 times for weeks at a time over the last two years Florida, Louisiana (not New Orleans), LA and mid west some place(I forget which) In Feb is due for a month in and around Texas starting with Houston.

I pointed out that average anything doesn't mean anything what I said is that the spread of wealth is incredibly uneven.

Who are you trying to kid about the health system in the US? Obama was elected on fixing it. That included the 45 million 6-7% without any cover. Have you seen those weekend free clinics on TV in one town in W Virginia where they had 16,000 poor people turn up because they had no other choice. Then let's think about the phamaceutical system.

If you're old or sick and you use up your allowance early you are out of pocket heaps and the drugs are much more expensive because of the fragmented negotiation system with HMOs and big Pharma's hold on the government.

So you think the US is great, you're entitled to , but at least when challenging figures compare oranges with oranges and in the same context.
Why is it when someone has more information than you, you start warbling about pontificating.
I reckon the point of discussion is to learn, something I do all the time, which I'm happy to do.
NB your stats are maybe right but don't relate to the question.

Yabby
Loved the jazz too Al's Place? or am I showing my age

Dear Thinker 2,

The US could easily eliminate absolute poverty.
In fact, if the money currently spent on federal
poverty programs were given directly to the poor,
instead of to federal and state bureaucracies,
it would raise the incomes of all the poor above
the poverty line, and still leave a surplus of
$25 billion (Daniel Seligman, "Why are people
poor," Fortune, Oct. 1, 1984).

Why, given that poverty is undesirable and that
the costs of eradicating it are so small, is this
not done? The reason lies in a pecularly American
belief: that the poor are in poverty because they
are idle and prefer to live on "handouts."

We lived and worked in the US for nine and a half
years, and found that this view is fervently held,
even by Americans who didn't know poor people,
have never tried to raise a family on welfare
payments, and haven't the vaguest idea what poverty
is really like. Opinion polls repeatedly showed
large sections of the population favouring cuts in
welfare spending or favouring plans to "make welfare
recipients go to work."

These atitudes bear little relationship to reality.
As you've pointed out - so many of welfare recipients
are children, aged people, or disabled, most of the
rest are mothers with young children, and less than
5 percent are able-bodied men, most of them unskilled
workers in areas of high unemployment. But there's
other myths: that welfare recipients are mostly
black (according to the polls nearly two-thirds are
white); that they have many children (most have two or
fewer), that they are on welfare indefinitely (most
receive welfare for less that two years) and that
welfare is a terrible burden on the taxpayer (welfare
represents 2 percent of the federal budget).
(Ian Robertson, "Sociology.").

CONT'D...

Why do these myths about the poor exist?
Ian Robertson tells us that "the ideology
that legitimates stratification in the US
holds that everyone has the same chance
to get ahead, and that inequality provides
rewards for personal effort. Most Americans
believe that the class system 'shows what
people made of their opportunities.' If those
who get ahead can claim credit for their
success, then those who fall behind must, logically
be blamed for their failures..."

The poor are therefore supposed to need incentives
to work, rather than help at the expense of the
taxpayer.

There are few complaints however about how the US
pays out far more in "handouts" to the nonpoor
than to the poor - in forms ranging from farmers'
agricultural price supports, to students' federally
subsidized loans and grants.

Robertson tells us that "Over the generations, the
human population has constructed castes and classes in
society... Like other stratification systems, social
class in the US arises out of specific historical and
social conditions. Since social stratification is socially
constructed it must, in principle, be socially modifiable
as well - provided only that people are conscious of
their own ability to change what they have created..."

Therefore whether they preserve, modify, or change the
system as it exists in the US is ultimately up to the
voters (people) themsleves.

I wouldn't hold my breath...

Foxy the system is not up to the voters.True democracy does not exist in the USA or here.

We exist in a system of corporate facism.
see "Fall of the Republic" youtube