“Being American is bad for your health,” said Robert Samuelson. That’s the sobering conclusion of an exhaustive new report comparing our health with that of people in 16 other advanced countries. We rank at or near the bottom, from life expectancy at birth to frequency of death before age 50, and it’s only partly the fault of our health-care system. […]
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Many experts consider the wealth gap to be more pernicious than the income gap, as it perpetuates from generation to generation and has a powerful effect on economic security and mobility. Young black people are much less likely than young white people to receive a large sum from their parents or other relatives to pay for college, start a business […]
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Think climate change is one of the world’s biggest problems? said Alex B. Berezow. Think again. Global warming doesn’t even crack the top 10 of the planet’s immediate concerns. Number 1 on that list: poverty. Nowhere near as “sexy” or “trendy” as climate change, it’s still the single biggest threat facing humanity. Hundreds of millions of people go hungry every […]
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Tokyo ‘Silver shoplifters’: Facing cuts in welfare and pensions, Japan’s swelling ranks of the elderly are turning to crime—many of them stealing food. Shoplifters are now more likely to be over 65 than under 18. Criminal offenses by the over-65 set have doubled in the past decade, even as overall crime has dropped. “Senior citizens shoplift lunch boxes and bread […]
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“We have grown literally afraid to be poor. We despise anyone who elects to be poor in order to simplify and save his inner life. If he does not join the general scramble and pant with the moneymaking street, we deem him spiritless and lacking in ambition. We have lost the power even of imagining what the ancient idealization of […]
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Recent polls show that the public has fallen into a mood of pessimism and fatalism. While Washington is halted in a gridlock creating a worrisome “leadership crisis”, many Americans fear that the country is unraveling. Little do they realize, The Greatest Era In Human History is upon us. This era has brought us incredible progress, with the nation’s cities at […]
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“When millions of people are suffering from a poverty which means hunger, malnutrition, sickness, illiteracy and degradation, we must not only remind ourselves that no one has a right to exploit another for his own advantage, but also and above all we must recommit ourselves to that solidarity which enables others to live out in the actual circumstances of their […]
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The richest counties got richer and the poorer got poorer in the last decade, according to census reports. The poorest county turns out to be in the heart of Appalachia — Owsley County, Ky. Owsley had the lowest median household income outside of Puerto Rico, according to census results. In Owsley, the median household income is $19,351. Over 41 […]
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More than 850 million people around the world—one in nearly seven—don’t have enough to eat. Although current global food production is sufficient to feed everyone, the number eating less than the minimum the human body needs—an average 2,100 calories a day for adults—now grows by more than ten million a year, mostly in the poorest nations. Countries with unstable food […]
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