Poverty In America

Although the modern world seems to be progressing, society still lags far behind in an aspect often overlooked by today’s fast-paced and self-indulgent culture. The primary concern that the world cannot seem to grasp is the proscribed topic of poverty. The concept of poverty is one of the most difficult and compound issues that society cannot seem to overcome. Poverty plagues every nation around the world, and there seems to be no definitive solution in means of solving the matter. Economies thrive as well as decline on the basis of the impoverished. Because poverty is such a unique and complex subject and so engrained into society, people from all features of life can slide into an impoverished state, which increases the difficulty in the

Although people tend to define poverty according to their individual standards, the matter can generally be described in standard meaning. The substance of poverty lies directly in the current state of decidedly scarce income and overall wealth. Falling into a limited monetary situation, however, is a process that is unique in the circumstances of different individuals. Individuals may steep into poverty for limitless reasons. Statistics show that 15% of Americans live in poverty – that is about 45.5 million people. Over the years, though, there have been active projects in order to combat this problem, the percentage of those living in poverty have seldom changed. In fact, the impoverished community seems to remain firm. The state of poverty comes in many different forms. The foremost reason individuals fall into poverty is rampant and increasing inequality amongst the classes – especially the gap between the rich and the poor. Because the rich chiefly influence the economy, the poor have little impact. The rich, in turn, get richer while the poor get poorer. A great share of this disparity is due to nearly unprogressive taxes and an unstable job market, which forced many blue-collar workers to sell their labor for lower wages . In addition, persistent concerns of race and gender equate to higher poverty among minorities that include

However, the management of poverty seems to evade the expertise of governments around the world. The American government has enlisted plans to help decrease the toil that poverty entails and aid in limiting the number of people who may fall into the situation. Measures such as Social Security, food stamps, earned-income tax credit, and many other programs were assigned to the purpose. According to an article published on www.nytimes.com, these programs have kept 40 million people out of poverty, a number that could have easily doubled without these measures in place. Though, with all these courses in place, poverty is still an uncontrolled issue. The issue remains only because of the initial root – money – and the drive of the economy. Progression can only happen with the correct funds. Typically, the government dedicates most of their discretionary budget towards military operations, which accounts for a little over 50% of the allotment, followed government operations, education, and then health – accounting for only 15% of the budget combined. In comparison, a menial amount of the budget is spent in other categories. In order to combat poverty, the government needs to spend, however the expense is commonly forgotten when writing the budget. Battling poverty costs and the government is characteristically not willing to pay. In turn, many living in poverty