". A 2010 follow-up study, UNICEF "Report Card 9," reported the same bad
news: The U.S. ranked 23rd out of 24 nations in the proportion of its
children in poverty, beating out Slovakia, which came in last." Written in an article about how free market is rated in the wealthiest countries, we as a nation show rather poorly. Yet, no matter how are economists and the current administration try to steer us in a more positive direction to get us back to having a middle class with fewer malnourished children, we are failing because the forces of evil have taken over in a war against our present government.
When McConnell uttered his goal of making President Obama a one-term president, people had no idea he would do it at the expense of the poor, the ill, the malnourished and only at the expense of the middle and lower classes of our nation. What is it that keeps people blinded to the dangers inherent in pushing the poor beyond their ability to tolerate.life. History has recorded the precedent of violence erupting when people feel totally helpless against the ones who take it all and flaunt it.suggesting that being rich proves their worthiness, that they deserve more than the poor because they are rich. Revolutions have usually followed.
Arlie Hichschild wrote a very interesting article on: How a Free Market Run Amok Destroys Family Values.The article starts with the statement: "We need a healthy market. But we also have to understand that some of
the policies said to free it can deeply hurt the families
free-marketeers claim to value." To read this article, click here.
When McConnell uttered his goal of making President Obama a one-term president, people had no idea he would do it at the expense of the poor, the ill, the malnourished and only at the expense of the middle and lower classes of our nation. What is it that keeps people blinded to the dangers inherent in pushing the poor beyond their ability to tolerate.life. History has recorded the precedent of violence erupting when people feel totally helpless against the ones who take it all and flaunt it.suggesting that being rich proves their worthiness, that they deserve more than the poor because they are rich. Revolutions have usually followed.
Arlie Hichschild wrote a very interesting article on: How a Free Market Run Amok Destroys Family Values.The article starts with the statement: "We need a healthy market. But we also have to understand that some of
the policies said to free it can deeply hurt the families
free-marketeers claim to value." To read this article, click here. 
1 comment:
The Hichschild piece has a number of problems. The UN report sited is an apples and oranges comparison, in that it does not apply one standard of poverty to the nations in the study. Instead, the U.N. report simply compiled each country's official government poverty statistics, and these countries have widely different criteria for determining who is poor. Many of those classified as poor in America and Britain would not be considered poor in other countries, hence their poor showing in this U.N. report.
U.S. Census Bureau statistics show that 43% of those Americans classified as poor own their home, %80 of poor households have air conditioning, nearly three-quarters of poor households own a car, 97% of poor households have a color TV, and 62% have satellite or cable. The middle class does not live this well in most countries. Now granted, there are plenty of American families that are hurting, and one child in poverty is one too many. But when a fair comparison is done, America is still the best place to be poor.
The other assumption that Hichschild makes is that America is the most free market nation on Earth. This may have been true in the past, but there have been rapid shifts in recent years. Economic freedom has declined markedly in America, while Europe has been adopting many free market reforms. In Paris, a major new artery was built and maintained by a private company. The postal services in the Netherlands, Germany, Sweden, New Zealand, and Japan have been privatized. The majority of European school systems now have some form of school choice. In the Heritage index of economic freedom, the U.S. now ranks tenth, behind nations such as Switzerland, Canada and Australia. Hichschild seems totally unaware of these changes, and hence concludes that markets in the U.S. are too free, when in fact it is far more likely that our markets are not free enough.
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