37 million people live in official poverty

In the richest country in the world, this is a shame…though, it does depend on what your definition of “official” poverty is, doesn’t it? In America today, if you are “officially” poor, the odds are you exist as follows:

• 46 percent of all poor households actually own their own homes. The average home owned by persons classified as poor by the Census Bureau is a three-bedroom house with one-and-a-half baths, a garage, and a porch or patio.
• 80 percent of poor households have air conditioning. By contrast, in 1970, only 36 percent of the entire U.S. population enjoyed air conditioning.
• Only six percent of poor households are overcrowded; two thirds have more than two rooms per person.
• The typical poor American has more living space than the average individual living in Paris, London, Vienna, Athens, and other cities throughout Europe. (These comparisons are to the average citizens in foreign countries, not to those classified as poor.)
• Nearly three quarters of poor households own a car; 31 percent own two or more cars.
• 97 percent of poor households have a color television; over half own two or more color televisions.
• 78 percent have a VCR or DVD player.
• 62 percent have cable or satellite TV reception.
• 89 percent own microwave ovens, more than half have a stereo, and a more than a third have an automatic dishwasher.

As a group, America’s poor are far from being chronically undernourished. The average consumption of protein, vitamins, and minerals is virtually the same for poor and middle-class children and, in most cases, is well above recommended norms. Poor children actually consume more meat than do higher-income children and have average protein intakes 100-percent above recommended levels. Most poor children today are, in fact, super-nourished and grow up to be, on average, one inch taller and ten pounds heavier than the GIs who stormed the beaches of Normandy in World War II.

There are indeed “poor” people in America, those that go hungry and those that have nothing. This is not the norm for American poor though. Most poor Americans are not “dust bowl, migrant worker poor” and are instead “can’t afford the new X Box” poor. Big difference, though most government agencies and class warfare politicians don’t want you to know that.