Almost 1 in 6 Americans living below poverty line

By David Usborne, US Editor

Thursday, 15 September 2011

REUTERS

A shantytown in Miami. The figures will dent optimism about a US economic recovery since 2008

New figures on income levels released this week confirm what many in the United States struggling to make ends meet already knew: it is a country in the midst of a poverty crisis that will define a generation.

Soaring poverty rates and a decade of stagnation in prosperity levels even for wealthier Americans emerge as the gloomy headlines from a new Census Bureau survey showing that 46.2 million people in the country were subsisting below the poverty level last year, more than has been seen in any year since the surveys began 52 years ago.

Last year an additional 2.6 million Americans fell below the poverty threshold, set at $22,113 for a family of four. Moreover, median household incomes dipped to a level not seen since 1997. The US has not seen such an extended period without growth in household income since the Great Depression.

The Census Bureau statistics amount to a study in gloom and lost optimism. The percentage of Americans living below the poverty threshold was the highest it has been since 1993 – 15.1 per, up from 14.3 per cent the previous year and 11.7 per cent in 2001.

...I'm there.  Been there for awhile.  Rest here: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/almost-1-in-6-americans-living-below-poverty-line-2354789.html