Poverty IS Like a Tragic Accident or Terminal Illness

To tell you the truth, until it happened to me -- when I needed  housing assistance and food stamps -- I did not know very much about the plight of other people who had to deal with similar circumstances.

I think one of the reasons is simple human nature. Most of us think that poverty -- like a freak tragic accident  or sudden terminal illness -- can only happen to other people.

The more we live, the more we acknowledge that that's a foolish, wishful thinking kind of assumption. Especially in regards to experiencing poverty in today's America. If the trends continue the way they have been in this zero-sum  economy with a growing population of super-wealthy (winners) on one side, buttressed by a growing population of  people living in moderate to acute poverty (losers) on the other, then the prognosis for one's financial  health in the American economy is not only ominously bleak, but, frankly, scary. 


According to the Social Work Journal,  'By age 35 nearly one-third of the U.S. population will have experienced a year in poverty. By age 65 more than half of all Americans will have spent a year below the poverty line, and by age 85, two-thirds. Rather than an isolated event that occurs primarily among what has been labeled the “underclass,” the reality is that the majority of Americans will encounter poverty firsthand during adulthood..'


So here we are now in 2013 -- with ever-growing numbers of people needing  housing and food assistance -- and the Republican dominated Congress of these United Sates is proposing to cut $20 Billion from SNAP or Food Stamps over the next decade. 

Why?

To cut our deficit?

Oh, if only it were so.

The truth -- and this is where it gets classically Orwellian (or just plain creepy) --  is that not only is it the very same Republicans who are calling for cuts in SNAP that bear major responsibility for the monumental deficits they  rung up under Presidents Reagan and the last Bush, but they are also the ones who promote and legislate lavish (tax-payer paid for) subsidies to already wealthy American citizens.

Here is just one (small) example of how this works, related specifically to the 2013 Farm Bill.(For a more thorough listing and analysis of these kinds of subsidies for the wealthy go to Inequality.org.)

Our pick of the litter: subsidies to agri-businesses in the name of 'crop insurance'. The Crop Insurance Program was originally designed  in 1938 to insure that proven productive farmers having an off year -- due to weather, soil erosion, pest infestation, what have you --  would be reimbursed for their crop losses and thus be able to remain in business for the next and hopefully better season. Nice idea: generous and practical.

Over the years, lobbyists for large agri-businesses have changed the program from insurance for failed crops, to blanket subsidies for farmers' revenues.  Here's how  it works:  if the price of, say,  soybeans goes down and the farmers' revenues go down accordingly; instead of allowing the much lauded free-market to sort it out, the federal government comes in and says here, we will (using taxpayers' money) make up your lost revenue. But we won't call it a subsidy, we'll call it 'crop insurance'.

Wouldn't it be nice if the federal government provided blanket revenue subsides to every business so that no one ever had a bad year?

No. 

It wouldn't work for the reasons socialist programs can't work -- they subsidize arbitrarily, not based on genuine merit or real need. 

Now isn't it ironic (or Orwellian if you want to go with the darker angle) that the same politicians for whom socialism is a dirty word are, in effect, practicing it. Well, in today's political world, words no longer have  literal meanings, they have a meaning that suits the user, and if the user has wealth and power; well, hopefully you've read  1984 so I don't have to rehash what happens next.   

So let's take this back to SNAP or food stamps.I wish I could report a  high-minded reason for why Congress wants to increase funding for crop insurance at the same timed it proposes to cut food stamps. . But what it really boils down to in the petty tit-for-tat circus-like political arena we are currently living in is: If you, the Democrats, want to help out poor people who vote for you then we, the Republicans, will help out the wealthy who vote for us.

Na-Na-Na-Na-Na-Na....

Maybe Orwellian was given them too much credit; come to think of it stupid or idiotic seem more apropos.And if I've insulted any professional clowns I also apologize for that.

This is not tit-for-tat to those affected by this legislation. A person who is working and struggling to make ends meet (and help prop up this lopsided economy) and is receiving some nutritional support and food security in order to sustain them is not comparable to someone who is being guaranteed to never have a bad year in revenues -- regardless of what they produce, or don't.  

 Need? Merit?

I don't know what else to tell you other than to ask you to please check out and sign the petition I wrote to Reform the 2013 Farm Bill that I will then forward to Congress.

I'd also like to invite you to read an excerpt from my latest book/memoir: An Odyssey in the Great American Safety Net.

Thank you,
James Abro 
Founder:  Advocate for Economic Fairness!

The proportion in poverty in 1969 stood at 12.1%. By 2011 it had risen to 15.0%. A larger proportion of Americans lived in official absolute poverty in 2011 than 42 years earlier. - See more at: http://inequality.org/absolute-poverty-america/#sthash.h3A2Heaa.dpuf

The proportion in poverty in 1969 stood at 12.1%. By 2011 it had risen to 15.0%. A larger proportion of Americans lived in official absolute poverty in 2011 than 42 years earlier. - See more at: http://inequality.org/absolute-poverty-america/#sthash.h3A2Heaa.dpuf

The proportion in poverty in 1969 stood at 12.1%. By 2011 it had risen to 15.0%. A larger proportion of Americans lived in official absolute poverty in 2011 than 42 years earlier. - See more at: http://inequality.org/absolute-poverty-america/#sthash.h3A2Heaa.dpuf

The proportion in poverty in 1969 stood at 12.1%. By 2011 it had risen to 15.0%. A larger proportion of Americans lived in official absolute poverty in 2011 than 42 years earlier. - See more at: http://inequality.org/absolute-poverty-america/#sthash.h3A2Heaa.dpuf

The proportion in poverty in 1969 stood at 12.1%. By 2011 it had risen to 15.0%. A larger proportion of Americans lived in official absolute poverty in 2011 than 42 years earlier. - See more at: http://inequality.org/absolute-poverty-america/#sthash.h3A2Heaa.dpuf

The proportion in poverty in 1969 stood at 12.1%. By 2011 it had risen to 15.0%. A larger proportion of Americans lived in official absolute poverty in 2011 than 42 years earlier. - See more at: http://inequality.org/absolute-poverty-america/#sthash.h3A2Heaa.dpuf

The Tony Awards -- an Insider's Perspective

I'd like to present for the first time a 'guest blog' -- one written by someone besides me.

Millions of us watched the Tony Awards the other night with an outsiders perspective -- probably finding it entertaining as well as offering us an opportunity to see many Broadway shows we won't get to see ( or can't afford to see) in person.

In the same way that many of us may shop at a Walmart or other wholesale outlets, and purchase and eat fruits and vegetables without knowing anything about what goes into their production, so it is true about much of the 'entertainment' we consume, including Broadway plays.

I read a 'review' of the Tony Awards by Fred Barton and asked his permission to reprint it here. 

Fred Barton is an American composer, lyricist, director, actor, singer, arranger, conductor, and pianist. He is  the co-creator and arranger and performer in the original company of the award-winning revue Forbidden Broadway. In 1985,  the show won a Drama Desk Award, and also won a special Tony Award in 2006.

So Mr. Barton is a Broadway insider; he knows what he is talking about. 

Here is his take on the Tony Awards:

"So I know you're dying to know. The fact that I had to run a search on the internet to locate the following information is everything that's wrong with Broadway today, and with the Tony [Awards]broadcast tonight. The unfortunate blonde with the aggressive street London accent, introduced only as "Velma Kelly in CHICAGO" is one Amra-Fay Wright, whose bio states that she has "starred in numerous musical extravaganzas worldwide," as well as the West End CHICAGO and other productions. She has no television credits, which is no disgrace, until you're on national television, and unable to find your teleprompter or have the forethought to memorize your five lines in case there's a fuck-up, and petulantly remark to millions of people that you or someone has fucked up and you don't know what to do. I wonder if she goes all Patti Lupone apeshit if someone misplaces her prop in a stage show, or if her fellow actor misses a cue.

The current Broadway cast members, en masse, should have flatly refused to appear unless they were identified by name, either by announcement or subtitle; my friend Judy McLane is not just some broad on the set in MAMMA MIA, she's fucking Judy McLane and deserves recognition; John Lloyd Young won the damn Tony Award himself, and did not deserve to appear as some anonymous fourth boy from the left in a generic JERSEY BOYS condescension. The producers of the show should be ashamed of themselves, although clearly shame is not on their list of skills. But the performers themselves bear some responsibility for this ignominious treatment; my friends, you're headlining on Broadway and people are paying big money to see you -- and even though Broadway is doing everything in its power to keep you down, to keep you anonymous, to keep you from being stars, and to keep you replaceable, you don't have to help them do it, even for a national TV appearance, which was designed to show you as grunts on a chain gang for the glory of others no more (and in some cases less) deserving."

Obviously, Mr. Barton did not watch the Tony Awards show with the same passive geniality as most. But I feel he makes some excellent points about  workers -- in this case actors -- and their relationship to the 'owners of their labors' that extend beyond Broadway and entertainers.  

I won't do him an injustice by paraphrasing him, so I'll repeat what I feel is the most poignant of his observations: The performers themselves bear some responsibility for this ignominious treatment; my friends, you're headlining on Broadway and people are paying big money to see you -- and even though Broadway is doing everything in its power to keep you down, to keep you anonymous, to keep you from being stars, and to keep you replaceable, you don't have to help them do it, even for a national TV appearance, which was designed to show you as grunts on a chain gang for the glory of others no more (and in some cases less) deserving.

I think we'd all feel better about our work, and create an even stronger economy,  if we heeded his advice to proudly value our work more highly. 

If you'd like to contribute a blog on a topic you feel passionate and informed about,  please message me on my Facebook page: 32 Beach Productions.

It's our Damn Country (and food) not Theirs...

This just off the morning news wires: "Though the week got off to a mixed start, the record books remain wide open this morning with the Dow seeking to extend a record Tuesday winning streak currently at 16. The Dow has not fallen on a Tuesday since January 8. The S&P 500, meanwhile, comes off yet another record close, with the Nasdaq chalking up a 12-1/2 year closing high."

Okay, so bully bully for them.

But at the same time, when the wealthiest Americans, including the owners of large farming conglomerates, are doing better than any time in recorded history, why is our Congress considering cutting the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program (SNAP, or food stamps) by more than $20 billion dollars over the next decade?

I think the most obvious reason is a complete disconnect from the realities of the lives that the governed live as opposed to the lives lived by the people they govern.  According to the Center for Responsive Politics, the average wealth of a Congress person is around $14 million. How in the world are they supposed to relate to or understand what on an average day 50 million of their fellow citizens experience: food insecurity -- not knowing if, or when,  you might get your next meal.

They can't. But it's not their damn country,  it's ours. 

Even though I have received them, I am not in favor of food stamps. I think that a nation like the USA, with its enormous wealth, should be able to create an economy that provides its working citizens with enough income to afford to buy their own food.

Even though that's not the way it is right now, I would like to alert you to a progressive trend toward agricultural and financial independence taking place among some legislators in the Congress.

They need our support or otherwise big money, as usual, will snuff out their ideas. 

Here's one: Senator Sherrod Brown (D-OH) has introduced a critical amendment that would  have a transformative impact on our food and farm system. It's called the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition amendment and is aimed at encouraging food and agriculture market development, entrepreneurship, and education. The Brown amendment to the 2013 Farm Bill would help create a better future for our nation’s food supply by aiding small farmers to grow healthy foodstuffs for local populations -- while at the same timed increasing employment in those same communities.Senator Brown: “By increasing access to fresh, local foods, we can expand markets for agricultural producers around the country while improving health, creating jobs, and strengthening our economy.”

Another equally important bill is called The Local Farms, Food and Jobs Act of 2013.


This bill, if passed by Congress , would  increase support for farmers who are growing organic and sustainably produced fruits, vegetables, meats and other healthy foods for local and regional markets. It would also increase access to these healthy foods in underserved communities.  

So the news is not all bleak, but one must support these innovative legislative initiatives less they get bowled over by well-heeled lobbyists for large argri-businesses.

I'll repeat it more more time, like a cheesy cheerleader: It's our country, not theirs!

One small way you can participate is by signing a petition I created with Noelani Musicaro, a food-security activist, to Reform the Farm Bill of 2013 by including progressive legislative measures that will give us increased food and job security, not less.

Please read & sign: A Petition to Reform  The 2013 Farm Bill 

Please also support and join my Facebook group, Advocate for Economic Fairness!  

And please also check out Noelani Musicaro's Facebook page:  Figlie di Fortuna

Be well!  Stay healthy!  And fight the good fight! --  Rah! Rah! Rah!