Families living in cars: Are policies, politicians to blame?
2 comments:
Shilpa S.
said...
I was thoroughly unnerved by this video-- particularly the statistic that more than 16 million kids are living in poverty at the moment (the most since 1962). When Arielle Metzger said, in regards to her living situations, that "it's just life", I couldn't help but think how unjust that sounded. No one entity is to blame for the situation at hand--the blame is to be shared. Politicians are not allotting the focus and care issues like the aforementioned deserve. The public's attention span is short, and as such, while the prominence of situations like the aforementioned in America might catch the sympathy and spark the rage of the populous for a while, the fervor to bring change will soon dwindle because the issue does not directly affect the lion's share of the populous. Furthermore, some impoverished families are not doing enough to lift themselves from poverty and are too reliant on the assistance of governmental and private organizations-- this, of course, does not apply to all impoverished families.
I was also shocked to hear that 16 million kids are living in poverty. But some of their attitudes toward their living conditions were inspiring to me. I think the fact that they're able to look past their difficulties and appreciate the little things makes them richer than some people living very comfortably. The video also made me think that our consumer-driven society has become so complicated, it's hard to be as free as people used to be. People used to be able to live comfortably off of a factory job, with only one spouse working. Now that companies have realized that both spouses can and want to work, the prices for everything have risen, making the focuses of our lives about making money and therefore the things that we can buy with that money. And as long as American companies continue to send jobs oversees because they feel that cheaper costs and sometimes lower quality are more important than American people being able to live in a home, the economy will only worsen. How can things get better when the prices of everything are rising, but there are less jobs available and wages/salaries stay the same or become even lower?
2 comments:
I was thoroughly unnerved by this video-- particularly the statistic that more than 16 million kids are living in poverty at the moment (the most since 1962). When Arielle Metzger said, in regards to her living situations, that "it's just life", I couldn't help but think how unjust that sounded. No one entity is to blame for the situation at hand--the blame is to be shared. Politicians are not allotting the focus and care issues like the aforementioned deserve. The public's attention span is short, and as such, while the prominence of situations like the aforementioned in America might catch the sympathy and spark the rage of the populous for a while, the fervor to bring change will soon dwindle because the issue does not directly affect the lion's share of the populous. Furthermore, some impoverished families are not doing enough to lift themselves from poverty and are too reliant on the assistance of governmental and private organizations-- this, of course, does not apply to all impoverished families.
I was also shocked to hear that 16 million kids are living in poverty. But some of their attitudes toward their living conditions were inspiring to me. I think the fact that they're able to look past their difficulties and appreciate the little things makes them richer than some people living very comfortably.
The video also made me think that our consumer-driven society has become so complicated, it's hard to be as free as people used to be. People used to be able to live comfortably off of a factory job, with only one spouse working. Now that companies have realized that both spouses can and want to work, the prices for everything have risen, making the focuses of our lives about making money and therefore the things that we can buy with that money. And as long as American companies continue to send jobs oversees because they feel that cheaper costs and sometimes lower quality are more important than American people being able to live in a home, the economy will only worsen. How can things get better when the prices of everything are rising, but there are less jobs available and wages/salaries stay the same or become even lower?
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