I really enjoyed reading this story with the authors perspective. I loved how she went in as an undercover journalist. I also liked how Barbara Ehrenreich used this story to investigate the impact of a problem in the United States, the 1996 Welfare Reform Act on the working poor. If you don’t know what the “working poor” is, it is the working people with which their incomes have fallen below the given poverty line. The related events that happened in the book took place a few hours after the actual event, between spring of 1998 and the summer of 2000.…
We are a society who seemingly emphasizes our commitment to the equality of all. We like to think that all people are equal and are afforded the same opportunities. We like to think that outside of our own bubble everyone lives just like us. We know inherently that it is not so. There is rampant inequality throughout society. According to the text book, inequality is defined as” the unequal access to scarce good resources” (Barisco,et al, p. 231.) This inequality can lead to a portion of society not having access to basic needs such as food, clothing and shelter. This inequality leads to a large population of hungry and homeless citizens in our cities.…
In the book “The Working Poor: Invisible in America” the author David K. Shipler discusses barriers and biases toward employability an example would be the appearance of Caroline in chapter 2. People are discriminated against because of their handicaps they couldn’t prevent and that keeps them from being hired or promoted even if they are hard workers.…
"Money Hungry" by Sharon G. Flake. The following book is about a thirteen year old girl named Raspberry Hill and her mother. Raspberry is known to be obsessed with money and will do almost anything to get it. Unfortunately, it's not a rumor, but it is true for one reason. Raspberry and her mother use to be homeless, and when they finally got a place in the projects, she promised herself she would never go back to being homeless again. She starts to make money the best she can, saving and never spending it.…
Many critics of the poor believe that they should take personal responsibility for their substandard living conditions; they only live in these conditions because of their own life choices and poor attitudes. However, according to Tommie Shelby’s Justice, Deviance, and the Dark Ghetto, the social conditions of the poor are due to failure of the government and affluent citizens to improve the underprivileged lives of the ghetto poor. If a person is criticized for turning down a menial job at low wages and applying for small welfare payments instead, Shelby would argue that the critic should not demand labor from those who do not receive the same benefits as the rest of society, because the social system is inequitable. In a fair system of social cooperation, there is reciprocity between people who regard each other as equals (page 127). This should be taken into consideration when criticizing the poor. Why should they be expected to play their part in social cooperation if they do not get to receive the same benefits? The poor are clearly not regarded as equal, in terms of granted opportunities, to a person from a higher class in society.…
After I read through the article " Sex,Lies, Advertising" of Gloria Steinem, I ran to the store to buy the Elle magazine which is sold for women. I understood more deeply about Steinem's criticizes for nowadays women's magazines. All most content in these magazines are only for advertising. Steinem who is a cofounder for Ms. magazine fight for all women's magazine. She saidthat these magazines need to be changed with more articles about cars, finances, cooking lessons... which is neccessery for women's life, it's not useless advertisings. "Goodbye to cigarette ads where poems should be…
Shelby Steele's "On Being Black and Middle Class", discusses the concept of victimization. Steele believes that the use of victimization is the greatest encumbrance for African Americans. In Steele's perception, white Americans see blacks as victims to ease their guilty conscience, while African Americans attempt to turn their status as victims into a kind of currency that will purchase nothing of authentic or continual value. Hence, Steele firms that blacks must seize "buying into this zero sum game" by adopting a "culture of excellence and achievement" without relying on "set asides and entitlements". By victimization, Steele is referring to the fact that humanity transforms their historical experiences of injustice into the centerpiece of cultural and group identity, for example blacks today are freer than at any other point in history, yet the identity is more acquainted with victimization than ever before. Steele's usage of the term affects his argument through his thoughts of why black middle-class Americans are unintentionally expected to celebrate the black underclass as the "purest" representation of African American identity. Steele presumes that the mistake that grew out of America's desire to fix the racial problem was that it inadvertently made victimization itself a kind of currency of power. Victimization now brings certain benefits, preferences, and entitlements. Steele claims that by "rewarding" victimization, the human population encourages blacks to think of themselves as victims. Other terms that could be used to counter Steele's argument would be every group that's seeking atonement from society - Hispanics, Asians, African Americans, even women. The "victim" mindset causes these groups fall farther and farther behind in American mainstream. The tragedy of victimization clutches much…
Flash forward to today, America has over forty-three million people that struggle with food security and over one-third of these people are children (Hauptmann, Cole). In terms of poverty, America is slightly worse as over forty-four million people are beneath America’s poverty line. While America has it way better than most other countries that have huge problems with hunger and poverty, America is definitely not perfect. The systems set in place in the 1970’s to alleviate hunger and poverty in America are now overtaxed and misused. Over 25% of federal disability claims were found as unnecessary and seemed to take advantage of only minor…
in his world it was believed that "What was not thought by all men cannot…
What’s poverty? Poverty is the state of being extremely poor, or unable to get money. One thing about poverty is that it is immutable. It is also a natural outcome of a competitive economy. One thing for sure is that Full-employment policy is too costly to consider, thus making it harder to acquire money. Poverty is a complicated problem that will most likely never be solved.…
America is viewed as the “Land of Opportunity”, yet 13.2 percent of the population is in poverty, with 3.5 million people homeless. ( ) But it is never considered…
Many Americans would describe poverty as destitution: an inability to provide a family with nutritious food, clothing, and reasonable shelter. A poll called “Poverty Pulse” was taken in 2002. It asked "How would you describe being poor in the U.S.?”…
Poverty is not just a problem in America, poverty is not just a problem in foreign countries, poverty is not just among a certain race, poverty is a worldwide issue that can affect anyone, even your community. Seeing examples of poverty throughout life can be very emotional, it lives all around. Pretty much anywhere there are people who are homeless, maybe begging for food or money. People walking to get where they need to go because they can not afford a car or possibly gas. Seeing kids at school come in without a jacket on when it is snowing outside because their families can not afford a winter coat for them. These are all examples of poverty.…
Hunger in America can be hard to recognize. With how the economy is now, the effects of hunger are more severe. Many Americans are relying on food stamps and private organizations to help with this crisis. Millions in this nation are currently suffering from hunger in America. Half of that being from job loss. More than 12,000,000 children suffer from food insecure hunger because of limited or uncertain access to nutritious food. About 900,000 are hungry in the three- country Detroit metropolitan area alone. The hardest hits are the elderly, the unemployed, immigrants, and the mentally and physically impaired.…
Detail – Just last year, the national poverty rate rose to include 13.2% of the population. 1 in 7 people were at risk of suffering from hunger in the United States. In addition, 3.5 million people were forced to sleep in parks, under bridges, in shelter or cars.…