Tuesday, October 12, 2004
Priorities, priorities
The Detriot News examines how the Bush tax cuts are affecting the working poor:
The Bush administration and Congress have scaled back programs that aid the poor to help pay for $600 billion in tax breaks that went primarily to those who earn more than $288,800 a year.
-clip-
Meanwhile, the Bush tax breaks for the richest 10 percent this year alone will total $148 billion.
That is twice as much as the government will spend on job training, $6.2 billion; college Pell grants, $12 billion; public housing, $6.3 billion; low-income rental subsidies, $19 billion; child care, $4.8 billion; insurance for low-income children, $5.2 billion; low-income energy assistance, $1.8 billion; meals for shut-ins, $180 million; and welfare, $16.9 billion.
The reduction in government assistance that accompanied the tax cuts couldn’t come at a worse time.
The number of Americans living in poverty has risen 10 percent since 2000, after falling in the late 1990s. Nearly 36 million Americans — one in eight — now live in poverty and tens of millions more are considered working poor.
The economy has lost nearly a million jobs — 241,000 in Michigan alone — since it slid into recession in March 2001.
That has increased the demand for government programs from millions of Americans who are now more likely to know hunger, homelessness and chronic need.
posted by chris at 11:55 AM
------------------
|
