poverty
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Category archives for poverty
Taking on the Prison Problem
Posted by Sharon Astyk on February 24, 2013 I get invited to speak to a lot of US Transition groups, and often I go. Often the leaders are blog readers, sometimes people I know through the internet, often future-friends. While every talk is different, they have some real similarities. Whether speaking in a suburb of Maryland, a large city in Ohio or to…
Becoming One of “Them”
Posted by Sharon Astyk on November 25, 2012 A friend of mine who volunteered at a shelter in New York City told me this story over Thanksgiving. The shelter she worked in responded to the range of people affected by the crisis. Many of them, as always in a crisis, were those who were already struggling and marginalized – illegal immigrants afraid to…
So the Poor are People…Really?
Posted by Sharon Astyk on October 21, 2012 A week ago, one of our former foster sons celebrated his ninth birthday. He’s now living with family in another state, and we have kept in regular touch. We sent a gift, a card with some pictures we thought he’d enjoy, and on the afternoon of his birthday, we tried to call and wish him…
But the Economy is Getting Better and Better…
Posted by Sharon Astyk on September 6, 2012 Shockingly (or not so much, if you read here regularly), despite the supposed improvements in the economy, more and more American families are struggling to put meals on the table. The USDA reports a record 46.7 million American households are on food stamps. 17.9 % of American households (up 700,000 from 2010) didn’t have enough food…
So, You Know You ARE the 1%, Right?
Posted by Sharon Astyk on May 23, 2012 So with the return of spring comes the return of Occupy, which by and large, is probably a good thing. OWS deserves some props for drawing attention to inequity, for bringing radicalism back, and for showing a very complacent corporate and political leadership that the people still have bite in them. Generally speaking I approve…
Wow, I’m the Deserving Poor!
Posted by Sharon Astyk on April 20, 2012 Note, no matter what I do it won’t embed properly – sorry about that. Here’s the link and thanks to Kerri for finding it: http://tinyurl.com/3sxfdjf Friend Jerah sent this to me, pointing out that since I don’t use a refrigerator, my family is among the .04% of the US population that constitutes the “deserving’ poor.…
Poor Mitt
Posted by Sharon Astyk on February 2, 2012 Now let’s be clear – we all knew Mitt Romney did not give a flying fuck about the poor. Other than the occasional service provider, he’s never met any poor people, first of all. Moreover, it is a fact that no presidential candidate, Democratic or Republican for the last 30 years has cared about the…
The Wealth and Poverty of Nations (and Neighbors)
Posted by Sharon Astyk on January 23, 2012 This is a revised version of a post that appeared three years ago, towards the start of the recession. It seems just as relevant, maybe more relevant, now. A while back there was a study that suggested that it is more expensive to be poor in the US in some ways, than it is to…
It is Poor Bashin’ Time!
Posted by Sharon Astyk on January 19, 2012 Well, as the republican donnybrooks narrow down, the enemy becomes evident – the American poor. Newt Gingrich particularly dislikes poor folk, especially poor children, because after all, if they were good people they wouldn’t be poor, they’d be working 50 hours a week in some nice sweatshop! Celeste Monforton at The Pump Handle has a…
Barbara Ehrenreich on the Criminalization of Poverty
Posted by Sharon Astyk on August 9, 2011 From Counterpunch, Ehrenreich, who, along with Jonathan Kozol and the late Joe Bageant and a vanishingly few others, tells the true story of American poverty more clearly than anyone else explores how we punish the poor:: The viciousness of the official animus toward the indigent can be breathtaking. A few years ago, a group called…