Poverty Figures May Be Wrong: "Journalists may have misunderstood Census data"

[Chris_]

You may have heard worried news reports that 50 percent of Americans had either fallen into poverty or are considered low income.

But while poverty in the United States is certainly an important issue, those figures appear to be wrong, perhaps based on a misunderstanding of the data by journalists who did not go back to the source to doublecheck their figures, said analysts at the U.S. Census Bureau district office in Los Angeles.

NBCLA worked with three data analysts at the Census Bureau to check the data, and the real figures do indeed appear to be quite different.

According to the latest Census data, about 49.9 million Americans – about 13.8 percent – are living below the poverty line. Another 53.8 million – about 18 percent – are considered low income because they earn less than twice the poverty level.

That’s a total of 31.8 percent, far lower than the dramatic figure of 50 percent that was included in more than 300 online news reports, and multiple TV news broadcasts, including Thursday’s “Today in LA.”

NBC Los Angeles

Uh huh.

[Boudicca]

We've all said it before, and it bears repeating:  anyone who is fat, yakking on a cell phone while watching a DVD on their big screen tv, and has clothes, free food, free medical care, and free education is not poor.

I thank God my parents refused food stamps and the free lunch program when I was a child.  Sure I had to bring a pbj sandwich and an apple and count out the pennies for my milk very carefully into the teacher's hand, BUT I learned the only things worth getting were the ones you could get for yourself.  Obviously not everyone is fortunate enough to be ablebodied enough to work, but most can.

Poor people in the ghettoes and trailer parks are their own worst enemies.  The way up and out for the past 50 plus years has been through the military.  I've encountered quite a few soldiers who climbed their way out and into a career, or to training that led to a career outside the military.  But anyone who shows any desire to excel seems to be a threat to the vast majority of lazy asses who are their so-called peers. 

[MrsSmith]

Escape via military has become far more difficult.  My former son-in-law wants to join, but can't.  He can easily get a normal GED, but the military won't accept that.  He would have to go through an "actually equivalent" GED program, and with his learning disabilities, the work is just beyond him.

Of course, this is no excuse for his equally distressing inability to keep a job that involves manual labor...that truly is just laziness.  (Hence the reason he's a former relative.)

[Boudicca]

Escape via military has become far more difficult.  My former son-in-law wants to join, but can't.  He can easily get a normal GED, but the military won't accept that.  He would have to go through an "actually equivalent" GED program, and with his learning disabilities, the work is just beyond him.

Of course, this is no excuse for his equally distressing inability to keep a job that involves manual labor...that truly is just laziness.  (Hence the reason he's a former relative.)

My son flunked several courses in his junior year; I saw no sense in wasting the taxpayers' money for him to stay in school.  He absolutely loathed classes, as they do teach down.  He got his GED two weeks later, age 16, and worked some minimum wage jobs until we let him enlist in the Marines on his 17th birthday.  He was unfortunately medically, honorably discharged before age 18 (yikes) but afterwards kept working, getting married, having a baby, getting a divorce, all those rites of adult passage, except divorce for some of us lucky ones.  He just started his EMT course and has been working for an ambulance company the past few months-he's 24 and has never NOT held a job.  So we're proud of him. 

The Marines accepted a normal GED for my son, but of course that was going on 7 years ago.   The Army, AF and Navy wouldn't take him, but that was okay with him, as he wouldn't take THEM either.

[MrsSmith]

My son flunked several courses in his junior year; I saw no sense in wasting the taxpayers' money for him to stay in school.  He absolutely loathed classes, as they do teach down.  He got his GED two weeks later, age 16, and worked some minimum wage jobs until we let him enlist in the Marines on his 17th birthday.  He was unfortunately medically, honorably discharged before age 18 (yikes) but afterwards kept working, getting married, having a baby, getting a divorce, all those rites of adult passage, except divorce for some of us lucky ones.  He just started his EMT course and has been working for an ambulance company the past few months-he's 24 and has never NOT held a job.  So we're proud of him. 

The Marines accepted a normal GED for my son, but of course that was going on 7 years ago.   The Army, AF and Navy wouldn't take him, but that was okay with him, as he wouldn't take THEM either.

Sounds like you did your best for him.  I had 2 that got GEDs instead of diplomas, but neither wanted to go in the military.  I think it was the Army that refused a "normal" GED, don't recall if he tried anywhere else.  Unlike your son, he hasn't much "gumption."   

[Boudicca]

He's your former son-in-law?  Wonder what his name at DUmmyville is?

[gonales3209]

A liberal professor colleague of mine scolded me by saying that poor people who hold minimal paying jobs are generally all hard workers.

I objected, "No they're not, not if they remain poor."

I reminded him that he said that he started out with nothing, that he earned his own way through college, that he never accepted a free dime from anyone else, just like me.

And then I announced, "In America, poor people who work hard, who mean to improve themselves and their lifestyle, won't be poor for long.

Dependency cycles dependency. Indepedency in upright conduct always breaks through.

[gonales3209]

I don't merely throw out grandiose words. The words come from the experience of life.

[formerlurker]

A liberal professor colleague of mine scolded me by saying that poor people who hold minimal paying jobs are generally all hard workers.

I objected, "No they're not, not if they remain poor."

I reminded him that he said that he started out with nothing, that he earned his own way through college, that he never accepted a free dime from anyone else, just like me.

And then I announced, "In America, poor people who work hard, who mean to improve themselves and their lifestyle, won't be poor for long.

Dependency cycles dependency. Indepedency in upright conduct always breaks through.

I don't think you can paint them all with the same broad brush.  There are those who do work very hard, and will always be poor -- everyone has a different capacity, and not all have that capacity to grab the brass ring. 

[gonales3209]

Show me an example of a person of high conduct who works hard remaining poor in America, or just imagine one.

A conception of a person starting poor and remaining poor in America, no matter conduct and work ethic, I suppose suggests that the person was cursed at conception to always be poor.

Not everyone has the capacity, or the drive, to make millions of dollars or grab the brass ring. Nevertheless everyone in America not severely physically or mentally handicapped can achieve a fine independent living, an obligation to one's self and to one's family, a characteristic of high conduct.

Still it's the one who limits or increases his or her own capacity, no matter whether a national economy appears dreary.

Rush Limbaugh says that he had accumulated wealth because he didn't allow outside influences, which no one has control over, to affect his progress.

Yet I'm fully aware of one big choice that's seemingly denied to everyone: the family and the country that a child is brought into.

[zeitgeist]

NBC Los Angeles

Uh huh.

And the DUmmies lapped it up like a bunch of kittens 'round a saucer of fresh milk.

Here:> http://www.democraticunderground.com/100290092

They are the vanguard of the liberal elite.

[Chris_]

If by vanguard you mean contemptible window-licking halfwits, then yes.