anarcho-queer:

While it’s no surprise that nearly 50 million Americans live below the poverty line, new statistics from the US Census show that almost 100 million others are counted as low-income citizens, making half of the population of America officially poor.

The latest figures out of the US Census Bureau show that in addition to the 49.1 million Americans who fall below the official poverty line, those that rake in enough to be between that level and the income equitable to double it fall into a new “low-income” category, which counts an additional 97.3 million people. Altogether, that clump of nearly 150 million Americans living in dire economic standing accounts for around 48 percent of the US population.

American officials have deemed the current poverty line to be at around $22,000 for a family of four, but the new category just about doubles that figure to $45,000 and places those that fall between the numbers as low-income. The Associated Press reports that for families that fit in that range, often half of the household income is spent on child-care costs and housing bills.

Taking into account medical, commuting and other living costs, the number of people living below 200 percent of the poverty level has been drastically changed and not for the better. Before those factors were taken into consideration, the US Census reported in September that only one-in-three Americans qualified as poor or low-income.

As RT reported earlier this year, the number of Americans living below half, or 50 percent of the poverty level, is equally as alarming. Around 20.5 million Americans — or 6.7 percent — have personal incomes that place them in that bracket, which equates to annual incomes of less than $5,570 for an individual or $11,157 for a family of four. In Washington DC, which is part of the wealthiest metropolitan region per-capital in the country, one-in-ten residents are grouped into that category.

Don’t fret though. It isn’t all doom and gloom! Some Americans are in fact seeing a turn for the better. While half of the country might be considered poor now, some citizens recently saw pay raises in the last year that were to the tune of 40 percent. Unfortunately, they probably didn’t necessarily need that bump. According to the Guardian, the top CEOs in America saw pay hikes between 27 and 40 percent last year. The paper adds that the highest paid exec in the US racked up more than $145.2 million last year, and the median value of their profits on stock options jumped 70 percent.

(via sociolab)

fuzzyhorns:

“Thousands of people are still without food, clean water, and electricity because of Hurricane Sandy. And the poorest are among the hardest hit.”

(via socio-logic)

An interesting fact about family homelessness: before the early-1980s, it did not exist in America, at least not as an endemic, multi-generational problem afflicting millions of poverty-stricken adults and kids. Back then, the typical homeless family was a middle-aged woman with teenagers who wound up in a shelter following some sort of catastrophic bad luck like a house fire. They stayed a short time before they got back on their feet.

In the 1980s, family homelessness did not so much begin to grow as it exploded, leaving poverty advocates and city officials stunned as young parents with small children overwhelmed the shelter system and spilled into the streets. In New York City, the rate of homeless people with underage kids went up by 500 percent between 1981 and 1995. Nationally, kids and families made up less than 1 percent of the homeless population in the early 1980s, according to advocate and researcher Dr.

(Source: azspot, via socio-logic)

The research team conducted two large surveys - one with 300 black Avon Representatives working in South Africa and one with 77 of their consumers - as well as interviews and focus groups with Avon management, Sales Representatives and consumers. They also attended meetings and training sessions and accompanied Representatives on delivery rounds.

The research found that, on average, the Avon Representatives earned enough to cover their typical household expenditures for food and non-alcoholic beverages, clothing and shoes, as well as healthcare. “Although the amount earned is very small, particularly from a UK point of view, this income, by itself, would put Avon Representatives in the top half of black females in their community and bring them in line with what a black man earns,” points out researcher Professor Linda Scott of Saïd Business School, University of Oxford.

The study also shows that women who relied on Avon for their primary income (and had worked as Avon Representative for 16 months or more) had earnings which placed them in the top 10 per cent of self-employed black women in South Africa. Women who had been working with Avon seven months or less and for whom Avon was their primary source of income earned considerably less (approximately 560ZAR (43 GBP) per month compared with the 1,400ZAR (108 GBP) per month earned by the longer term Representatives.

Nearly three-quarters of the Avon Representatives surveyed stated that Avon had given them financial autonomy. The researchers found that 92 per cent had their own bank account, as compared to only 38 per cent of black South African women having any bank account.

But, the benefits of becoming an Avon Representative were more than financial. Some 89 per cent of respondents said they had received job training that could be used to get other employment and 88 per cent of those surveyed said that their experience with Avon had made them more self-confident. Many interviewees claimed that their Avon work had transformed them into a role model for their children and allowed them to ‘fulfil their dreams’ of self-sufficiency.

(Source: sociolab)