Shocking new statistics from the USA

[kre8ivelyXposed]

According to info in the NY Times and CNN today, about 1 out of every 6 US citizens is living in poverty and 50 million people don't have health insurance. This is a travesty for such a supposedly wealthy country. Although Argentina is a mess in many ways, it is still an emerging democracy and many of its problems are "understandable" given the current and historic conditions. But the USA is now "taking the cake" on inequality for a First World country..... ugh...

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/14/us/14census.html?ref=us

 

[MichaelG]

shocking seens!

 

[steveinbsas]

What does this have to do with expat life in Argentina?

The last ten years I lived in the USA I was legally homeless. I never took a dime in public aid, applied for food stamps, or enrolled in Medicaid. Nonetheless, I paid for my own hospital insurance (Blue Cross Blue Shield) the entire time and just before "leaving America" I went to a neighborhood health center (Howard Brown) to get vaccinations for hep A and B.

Because of my low income (WAY below the poverty line) I was charged 10% of the "regular" rate.

Before this I had donated all of the remaining inventory from my men's designer resale store in Chicago to the "Brown Elephant" thrift store (operated for the benefit of the Howard Brown Memorial Clinic). I was legally homeless and living in the back of my store...going to the YMCA everyday to shower...prior to starting my daily rounds of shopping in thrift stores for men's suits and sport coats.

The manager of the BE suggested I go to the clinic for the vaccinations when I told him why I was "redonating" so much stuff I had previously bought there (I was moving to Mexico.)

PS: I became homeless after the tax reform act of 1986 eliminated "loopholes" in the tax code that resulted in the collapse of the housing market (and the housing construction industry) in Salt Lake City...even though I was not using any of the loopholes to avoid paying taxes, I lost six apartments and my own home (luxury condo), plus my BMW sedan and Mercedes station wagon as well.

Governments may actually create even more poverty than they alleviate...in spite of trillions of dollars made in direct payments to the poor.

People line up (and lie down) to get money for free.

Many also stay down as long as the free money is available.

Ugh, indeed.

And please don't tell me because I'm white I've never been discriminated against.

I was a Gentile in UTAH and I was forced into chapter 7 (involuntary) bankruptcy.

It was clear to me that if I had converted to the LDS church my apartments would have been rented and I would have kept everything.

After I politely declined, the "treasurer" of my condo association told my lawyer that they wanted the "gentile bastard" out of the building.

I complied with the order of the court.

Then I moved to Illinois and started over (the reverse of the Mormon migration).

As one of my favorite actors once said (the last two words of the film The Color Of Money), "I'm back."

And I'm no longer homeless.

 

[Davidglen77]

I give credit where credit is due.......at least here you can be poor but still have health coverage at no cost. In the USA you will be poor AND uninsured. I say a round of applause for Argentina on this one!

 

[MichaelG]

What does this have to do with expat life in Argentina?

The last ten years I lived in the USA I was legally homeless. I never took a dime in public aid or enrolled in Medicaid. Nonetheless, I paid for my own hospital insurance (Blue Cross Blue Shield) the entire time and just before "leaving America" I went to a neighborhood health center (Howard Brown) to get vaccinations for hep A and B.

I have also been very down and out in a country that wasnt the USA, but anyway, I also never took $1 dollar of help from anybody, when I could have

And now it feels so good knowing that everything I have now is only down to me, it's a great source of strenght. A great satisfaction , I'm sure u know whay I mean Steve

 

[sesamosinsal]

We need to put this into perspective. In the United States, a family of four making less than $22,113 is impoverished. We'll not even talk about taxes and whatever else because at the end of the day they get child tax credits. Let's just assume they have $22,113 flat out for a year.

Per month, that's $1,842 USD, or 7,736 ARS. How many families of four live on less than that in Argentina and wouldn't be considered impoverished? The standards for poverty in the U.S. are much higher. I'm not saying life is all hunky-dory living with that salary, but we're not talking Ciudad Oculta here. Many people live on less, however, and some even in villa-like conditions.

With that said, I am the first to congratulate Argentina on priding itself on social benefits. I defend President Kirchner on many issues, and I detest the people on this forum who say everything that she has done is terrible for the country. She's done both bad and good things.

Furthermore, everyone is different, and not everyone has the ability to pull themselves up by their bootstraps. There are also a lot of lazy people out there who just don't want to work. Just because you never needed social assistance doesn't meant that no one ever will, and just because someone who is receiving social assistance is lazy doesn't mean that everyone who receives social assistance is lazy.

These issues aren't black and white, and I think we'd get a whole lot further in political discussions if we quit painting them as such.

 

[chris]

That poor family in the US earning the equivalent of nearly $8,000 pesos a month will get many benefits from the government including food stamps. I'm pretty sure medical care will also be available. I believe Medicaid is available for the children as well as other medical services, clinics etc. The US really does not throw its poor on the street to starve as some people suggest. I agree that the US definition is very different from the world's. When I was in college I had a friend from Kenya. One Easter he came back with me and I took him on a tour of the city that included an inner city ghetto. He saw the point that I was trying to make - that the US was not all middle class - but his reaction was very different from what I had expected. He told me that in his country most people lived in thatched huts with dirt floors, without running water or electricity. He pointed out that the people in the inner city had solid brick homes, running water, gas, electricity, TV and some even had cars. This, he said, was not poverty by Kenyan standards and he blamed the people who lived there for not taking better care of the streets around their homes. I am not justifying the growing gap between social classes in the US. It's a serious problem. I am just pointing out that Americans have a different concept of what is poor. I heard the same sort of comment from the steward on a freighter crossing the Pacific. He told me that after seeing so much poverty in the ports he had visited in parts of Asia that he had a different idea about what it is to be poor. When he went back to LA and told his friends in the inner city they got angry and just didn't want to hear it.

 

[Quinn]

Its funny how the definition (based on a financial figure) of "poverty" seems to change from administration to administration. During the Bush years, the number went up, then during the last presidential campaign, the number went down according to one side of the aisle...to help facilitate the need for change. Then the opposite side of the aisle uses the same number created to this time use it for their good in facilitating change.

Those of use who enjoy traveling who have seen all aspects of the world know what poverty is. Many know it from what they see everyday even here. But it's tough to really lump the US poverty in the same category when there are nations where the standard of "poverty" is so much lower. Even in San Francisco, one of the cities in the Us with the highest rate of people living in poverty (homeless), as only in SF, because the city pays higher benefits than any other city in the US. But when in SF, you can be in 9/10 of the city itself and you wouldn't think there was such a huge problem.