As a global powerhouse the U.S is seen as the standard that most countries want to live to. It boasts the best economy in the world and has a major impact on the economy of other countries. Knowing all of this one would naturally assume that such a country has minimal to no poverty issues. However, that is not the case. In fact, U.S poverty rate, according to Angus Deaton’s article The U.S Can No Longer Hide From It’s Poverty Problem, is comparable to those of the poorest countries in the world.
Why I Am Drawn to Poverty in the U.S
The popular belief among immigrants to the U.S is of its high standard of life and the image of its golden streets. For them it is where their dreams of success are meant to come true. Whatever country they originally came from did not support such hopes so they sought it in a country that was formed by immigrants who themselves were escaping the harsh lifestyle of their mother/father country. I would know because I myself came here when I was four. While I did not fully grasp this dream or what America was, I knew it was something great. It was much later in high school that I came to learn that the U.S has a true poverty crisis and that it has been going through it for a long time.
When I was in Elementary school teachers used to scold us for throwing away our unfinished food and remind us of the starving people in Africa. Today Haiti’s and India’s poverty have been well documented. I have always viewed the U.S as being above every country in practically everything from economy to the military. Poverty in the U.S? So implausible that it did not even cross my mind. So when I learned that the U.S had a severe poverty problem, I was stunned. I wanted to learn more. How poor are the poorest Americans, in what parts of the U.S do they live, and how did it get to this stage?
No Hiding From the Truth
Angus Deaton tries to open the eyes of his readers in his NYT article The U.S Can No Longer Hide From It’s Poverty Problem to the seriousness of poverty in the U.S. One of his evidence comes from the World Bank that shows that in 2013, 769 million people lived on less than $2 a day. Of the 769 million people, 3.2 million of them lived in the U.S. While the U.S is known for having safe food and water as well as providing medical care, according to Deaton, you will find that the poorest Americans somehow do not have access to these benefits. He astonishingly states that the Mississippi Delta and Appalachia have a lower life expectancy than Bangladesh and Vietnam. He goes on to share his belief that too much focus goes to African and Asian poverty issues while Americans are being ignored.
Harshest Place to Live in the U.S
In his NYT article Where Are the Hardest Places to Live in the U.S.? Alan Flippen goes into greater detail on where in U.S poverty strikes the hardest. Using education, median household income, unemployment rate, disability rate, life expectancy, and obesity, Upshot, NYT data analysis, attempts to determine the living conditions of each county in the U.S. The result has Clay County, Kentucky, as the hardest place to live in all of the United States. It’s neighbors in the Appalachian Mountains (Breathitt, Jackson, Lee, Leslie, and Magoffin), all rank in the top 10 of the poorest counties in the U.S. The main similarities between the poorest counties in the U.S is their high percentage of people with disabilities and their low level of education.
We Must Continue to Seek
It is important to further explore this topic because it is an issue that has been going on for a while and yet the solutions have yet to be determined. There is a poverty crisis in the U.S and some people don’t even know about it. It is now time for the U.S to address this problem. It can’t hide anymore.
Citation
Flippen, Alan. “Where Are the Hardest Places to Live in the U.S.?” The New York Times, The New York Times, 26 June 2014, www.nytimes.com/2014/06/26/upshot/where-are-the-hardest-places-to-live-in-the-us.html?mtrref=undefined&gwh=A25244DF743D4018866C83FAA0FCCADE&gwt=pay.
Deaton, Angus. “The U.S. Can No Longer Hide From Its Deep Poverty Problem.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 24 Jan. 2018, www.nytimes.com/2018/01/24/opinion/poverty-united-states.html.
