For the fourth straight year, poverty has increased under the Bush Administration, according to this AP article:

"The Census Bureau said household income remained flat, and that the number of people without health insurance edged up by about 800,000 to 45.8 million people.

Overall, the nation's poverty rate rose to 12.7 percent of the population last year. Of the 37 million living below the poverty level, close to a third were children.

The last decline in overall poverty was in 2000, during the Clinton administration, when 31.1 million people lived under the threshold. Since then, the number of people in poverty has increased steadily from 32.9 million in 2001, when the economy slipped into recession, to 35.8 million in 2003.

The mention of Clinton, under whose leadership poverty declined, takes me back to the good old days when a Democrat was running the economy instead of running it into the ground.

Last time I checked the economy is at an all time high. Even with a slight increase in poverty levels, the percentages are still some of the lowest in 25+ years. Way to take a few numbers from the whole picture to skew it (see link below).

http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/pover...pov05fig05.pdf


You're good ole days produced the 9-11 attacks, the economy bursting in 2000, and the army being reduced to a fraction of itself (which it's still trying to recover from). Go to another forum and spew your crap there.

16,000,000 poor children is unacceptable. Americans are brought up to be greedy and covetous when it comes to money. Just because the Stock Market economy is doing well does not mean that all of us are benefiting... What it means is that more and more wealth is being concentrated in the Market so that the top 1% is doing ultrawell with our money from the tax cuts they recieve and the gov't subsidies that we allow them to take advantage of. If you really think that this gov't and corporate interests are looking out for our best interest I have to say your naivity is what is killing this country! And by the way seeing as how this is the USA and we have a Constitution that allows me to say what I want, when I want, I will always exercise that right despite closeminded naive people that eat up whatever the gov't and corporations feed them. Also notice the increase in poverty whenever so-called conservative republicans are in office. Coincidence? I think not...

Actually, according to your original quote, the number would be closer to 12 million.

"Of the 37 million living below the poverty level, close to a third were children."

And although 12 million kids in poverty is still unacceptable, you should at least get your numbers straight...

It just a fact of life

"The RICH get richer" & "The POOR have Welfare" & "The middle class pays for all of it"

it is a sad fact of life but unless one of us is gonna be president someday its gonna stay that way. this country is run by the rich for the rich. you don't see any poor senators or congressmen do you and my guess is you never will.

Oh, and sportboy - play nice!
Ted's welcome to post his thoughts here...

I read the other day (I can't find the article):

I don't know about you but most people I know are doing better today than they were 10-20 years ago(lower, middleclass, and upper middleclass). Better cars, buying homes, etc.

The unemployment rate is lowest it's been in years:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/...in640754.shtml

Maybe I'm naive, but to me that sounds like improvement.

You have to think relatively. Sure the percentages may be down but the actual amount of people has risen. Let's say for instance:
100 people-20 poor among them 20%

1000 people-200 poor among them still 20%

Some anylysts would say "The percentage is stagnant."

The fact:Actual increase in the number of people who are impoverished.

Our population increases exponentially. Take that into acount with your percentages people...I was one of those people for months because I was a skilled trades worker and there were limited positions available...And the argument that therte is work out there, sure tell a skilled tradesman like myself who was making 18 an hour and living within those means that I should go work for some service industry job for 7.50 and still live the same life. People are losing their entire life's savings, their houses, cars, everything. Have some compassion and stop being greedy.

BTW Sorry about the number foul up. There are so many sources out there it's hard to keep track of what's what. The census is not infallible!

Also the unemployment rate does not include people who have run out of unemployment benefits and no longer report to the Unemployment programs...