There is a truly disturbing report out of Chicago that highlights the massive wealth gap in our country. The Springleaf Financial Strength Survey, found that 33 percent of Chicagoans are living paycheck-to-paycheck and have less than $250. Nationwide 43 percent of families are living paycheck to paycheck.
The Chicago figures are worse than the nation as a whole, which themselves are pretty dismal. Twenty-four percent of families have less than $250 in their account.
This follows a report that wealth has risen to a record $263 trillion, but people (with a net worth of $1 million or more) represent a mere 0.7 percent of the planet’s population control 41 percent of its wealth.
Source: CNN
Annie, I want everyone receiving aid of any kind from the taxpayers tested for drugs!
Loved the map. Notice how many know staying in warm areas is a whole lot better.
Chicago is the epitome of what Government can do to ruin your life. The Great Society drove Black men out of their homes because the family could get more from the Government than he could provide. The destruction of the American family has been the gift of liberals that keeps on giving. And voters still vote for Democrats!
What I don’t understand is why they stay. I would spend every waking hour looking and working for a way out. But this is a fourth or fifth generation living like this. It’s the only life they know.
When the poor of New Orleans left after Katrina, churches and other organizations helped moving them to places with job availability. When NO said they could come back, they said no way!
How could we apply the kind of help homeless people from NO got and apply it to Black families in Chicago? The key is family. Mother, father, kids. If only one family a month it’s worth it.
Areas that are accustomed to many colors could help through their churches. A church could sponsor a family with help from the congregation. If the father has no skills, teach him something. Be sure the kids are in school and help them learn. Mother can work part time when her children are in school. With enough attention and encouragement their lives could be so much better. Churches should get any welfare $$$ and use these to pay for housing, clothing, etc. There are many churches that have a home visiting program. A member spends time with families to check on progress and needs.
Change happens one step at a time. But the first step is the most important.
I didn’t vote for Obama, but if he had helped the Black people to be active members of society and talked about staying in schools, I might have in 2012. but in four years there was no effort to help Black children. I know many people that voted for him in 2008 hoping he could change the Lives of Black and other minorities.
Instead, he’s made life worse for everybody!
The statistic that headlines this story means nothing. People choose to live that close to the edge. It has nothing to do with wealth. Crazy rich people go over the edge all the time. There has been a rising tide for thousands of years that has made everyone wealthier. The times where poor people suffer a drop in life style is usually when some government bombs their neighborhood or inflates the currency until it is worthless. The rich cannot rip you off without the direct support of the government. The main activity of government is exchange favours …. and take wealth from the average inhabitant.
Just this week I read about major ( huge ) advances in medical consumer science , consumer electronics and the ability to deal with pollution. So I think the gross standard of living is rising.
When people feel safe… they take more risks ( Peltzman effect [PE] ). A corollary of PE has to do with saving for a rainy day.
99guspuppet
Paul – I am basing on the real world inability of AIG to pay off derivative “insurance” policies that were going to lead to the collapse of the entire financial system……..sans the Bush bailout.
Since you appear unwilling to research this yourself, why don’t you ask other conservatives? A few will always put party before country. But on this I imagine most will tell you the financial system was going to collapse – Wells Fargo was just another domino.
Guessing that you will once again somehow make your poor grasp of subject matter my responsibility, I won’t check back for your comment – and as conservatives always have to have the last word, am sure you will. But as our financial system exposure to derivatives is higher now then in 2007/2008, every American should be well read on a subject that presents a much greater risk then the ebola, isil, immigrant, etc………… threats that dominates the low info. American media.
Bill W.- so, you are unable to back up your claim about Wells Fargo. I knew you couldn’t. You did blow a lot of smoke though. Pretty smoke, but still smoke.
Bill, I think it’s time to give Paul a cookie, a pat on the head and to dismiss him from Econ 101, as it’s obviously above his head.
Annie – I will match my M.A. against your M.Sn anyday.
@ Paul – “chicken little trouble”? LMAO! The entire banking system was shot without the TRILLIONS in government guarantees. Wells Fargo was just one of many of the gambling financial companies that would have folded without the Bush bailout. I believe some of those estimates go up to $17 trillion in government guarantees.
There are numerous links (just type a search something close to what I suggested) on the “financial meltdown”. If you TRULY WANT TO LEARN the underpinnings of what caused it (and may cause another meltdown), then it will take hours of research…………….and a willingness to have an open mind and learn. Please also study some of subsequent financial scandals – especially the Libor scandal just so you can get an idea of how far private companies will go to rig your so call “free market” to ensure they win every time.
If not, then in this country you are free to keep advertising an extremely limited grasp of the subject matter.
Bill W – I am more interested in what YOU are basing your conclusions on. Cites please.
“Paul C. Schulte
Bill W – all you have is supposition, no facts. You are mixing apples with orange”
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Supposition? Are you kidding me? Do you really have no idea about the mechanisms (derivatives, CDO’s, etc….) that caused the “financial meltdown”? YOU have no facts. You simply have a statement from Wells Fargo. And if that is all it takes, then there is a bridge in Brooklyn that the Koch bros would also like to sell you).
The reality is that our system while very slightly adjusted (lots of Dodd Frank was written by the banks) in 2008, but was never fixed. And now we are likely even more subject to Wall Street’s privatize the gains and socialize the losses the mentality that so called free market republicans support.
I can’t make you learn about what happened in 2008 if all you want to believe is corporate propaganda. But I can tell you that whatever web sites you are going to come up with Wells Fargo didn’t need the money (THE WHOLE SYSTEM NEEDED THE TRILLIONS GUARANTEED) or “do you think his blackness (Obama) is the reason……….” is not helping with your unsupported positions.
if you have a few minutes (actually hours to really learn) try typing in “derivatives” and “financial crises” or “financial meltdown” in 2008 (or something to that effect) and you will really help strengthen your posts…………….or just keep posting stuff from the misinformed party before country websites – those that are better read always could use a laugh.
btw – I have worked for 2+ decades in Finance and Insurance! How about you?
Bill W – if you would like to link to something that shows that Wells Fargo was in actual financial trouble, not chicken little trouble, then cite it.
Bill W is correct. Wells Fargo was another weak link in a chain of weak links and would have crashed and burned with the others.
Mike A – care to back up your claim about Wells Fargo?
“Paul C. Schulte
Bill W – Wells Fargo and one other bank were forced to take the money. It wasn’t ALL banks but they wanted us to think it was all of them because it made the nanny government look better.”
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Woefully incorrect. If the government didn’t agree to backstop the system and pay off AIG gambling debts, the banking system, including Wells Fargo, would have crashed. The $25 billion itself was mostly symbolic as a confidence builder to fool a gullible public that that small sum was all that was being done to bail out the banks. However, it was the TRILLIONS guaranteed as a backstop that really saved all our banks….including Wells Fargo. And if Wells Fargo, and other banks, would have accounted for its assets on a “mark to market” basis then likely they were all insolvent.
btw – what would make you think that a leader in mortgage originations would have been the most secure bank? just because they said so?
Remember when George H W Bush broke his promise to save something (I can’t even remember). Anyway, the government ended up owning a ton of houses. Well, by the time all those houses were sold we made money on the deal. I lived through the “ice age of 1975” and assume I will live through this. Hot as h__l this year! But Iowa has a ton of snow. Mother Nature puts us in our place now and again.
Bill W – all you have is supposition, no facts. You are mixing apples with oranges.
Reblogged this on Citizens, not serfs.
Large numbers of people have their 401K money in the stock market, oblivious to the fact that the stock market may actually go down once interest rates go up. If stocks go down 25% and stay there for 10 years – like they’ve done before, a lot of retirees are going to be in a world of hurt.
@SandiH
I am not so sure that privatizing Social Security would ever work. What would happen to people who put their money into Penney’s or Sears??? Or Eastern Airlines? They would hit old age broke. Plus, Wall Street would clean up on fees moving your money back and forth, and before you know it, you could get Corzined like the people at MF Global, or Bernie Madoffed.
Plus, I think the stock market is tremendously overpriced, and always is as a systemic thingy. That is why when there are big selloffs. the prices drop like rocks. I think stocks should be valued more like bonds, and based upon their dividend rate. Sooo, if a stock is paying a $2.00/year dividend, and the current interest rate is 2%, then 1 share is worth about $100. That is the amount that you would have to deposit to earn $2.00 in a safe investment (bank deposit). But, if the current interest rate is around 4%, then I could put $50 into a interest bearing account and make my $2.00. Why would I pay $100 for the stock??? That same money would earn me $4 in the bank, not a mere $2.00.
Sooo, why pay $100 for the stock??? Well, that is because I am gambling that the value of the stock will increase over time more than my bank account with it’s interest. Or, I think somebody else in the future will pay me more for my stock than I paid for it, and in excess of what I could earn in the bank. Or, I am looking at the liquidation value of the stock, and think that it is safe, in addition to the above. Or, I think that inflation will cause my money in stock to grow more than my money in a bank. But over all, all those reasons are gambles to me, and not something I would want to risk my old age money on.
Over all, that is why the bond market is about 10 times as big as the stock market. Right now, the interest rate is real low, sooo moneyed people are parking their money into stocks, paying the interest on margins, and then rotating in and out of stocks. But it is like musical chairs, and I expect that a lot of muppets will die horrible deaths when the music stops.
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
Squeeky and rcocean, I should have added the investments would be in approved plans, and we have moved our stock out of the 401K. Everyone with a 401K can do that. I don’t think approved plans would be stock, but IRA, mutual funds, and new ones specifically developed for these investments. My problem is it won’t get changed until someone starts! The American people need to understand that life as we’ve known it prior to 2001 is different and costs a great deal of money. Things need to change before the whole thing crumbles.
@LloydB
Oh, and FWIW, here is a better link!
http://www.statisticbrain.com/welfare-statistics/
If you will notice, both White and Blacks each account for 40% of the 13 million welfare recipients. However, Blacks do that with only 13% of the population as compared to Whites at 73%. This makes Blacks about 5 times over-represented on the basis of race. Therefore, states with a high percentage of blacks, will tend to inflate the welfare statistics. Just as I said before.
You and zedalis can apologize now for calling me names.
Thank you!
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter