Census report: Half of Americans poor or near poor - World Socialist Web Site

23.10.14

Census report: Half of Americans poor or near poor - World Socialist Web Site: The release of these figures, as well as last month’s official poverty figures, have been greeted with silence in the media, despite the fact that the US is a mere two weeks away from a midterm election. As with every major social and political question, the issues of poverty and social inequality are being totally excluded from debate and discussion in the elections and ignored by the two big business parties.

The figures follow the release of a series of reports and studies documenting the growth of social inequality in the United States. Last week, Credit Suisse reported that the top one percent of the world’s population controls nearly half of all wealth, and that the United States has nearly ten times more super-wealthy people than any other country.