First, I'm watching this during the first State of Union, pardon problems with typing and grammar.
Alright, so this here is a handy dandy "if you're going to read one book" type review. The book is title "All you can eat: How hungry is America?" by Joel Berg.
Now, aside from the snicker about how "hungry" America is when we have an obesity epidemic (and Berg confronts this irony in the opening chapter; he coulda just come up with a better name) don't prejudge this book. It's more than just simple Food Stamps, charities and the like. The book delves into issues as broad as corporate agro-business problems, fast food and US poverty. It simply an astounding amount of research all packed into one book. It's an amazing jumping point for the laymen on the issue of hunger and poverty in America. Rather than right individual chapter reviews or whatever (I don't read many book reviews), I'm going to pull out selections from the book. If this is illegal...um...sorry? (why are you reading my blog Joel Berg/Seven Stories Press?)
Actually...I just realized, that's a lot of typing so...Summarize!
p. 132 Break down of who lives in poverty. 37.2 million people lived in poverty in 2007. of that less than 1/5 were of working age (over 18, under 60) and not officially disabled. So the next time someone tells you that your only poor if your lazy...well, I don't advocate violence (Give'm the chair!!)
p. 135 Lays out exactly why its a catch-22 to be poor. If you're poor it's almost impossible to escape poverty.
137-8 Immigration reform and why it's necessary (Mexicans are more than 4 times as likely to die than the avg worker on the job) and moves right on to "An Endangered Middle Class"
144 Taxing the rich, or as he terms it "Welfare for Rich People". Not just the new gov bailouts obviously, but the general giveouts to big business that has plagued America for the past 1/4 of a century. Bloody Reagan, bloody neo-cons
149 Break down of the amount spent on Food Stamps vs Farm Subsidies (shocking, I mean truly shocking)
Chapter 9's title says it all; "The Poverty Trap: Why it is so hard to escape poverty in America"
it's really quite brilliant (notice how we're not just talking about food stamps here, we're talking about the breakdown of the cause of poverty)
p. 230 Let's play a game of "What are the Odd's"
being murdered: 1 in 17,576
murdered by terrorists: 1 in 103,860 (in 2001 that is)
murdered by terrorists in 2007: 0
killed in a plane crash: 1 in 2,262,e302
killed in a car crash: 1 in 8316
injured by a shark: 1 in 7878907
living in a household that suffers from food insecurity: 1 in 8
forced to get food from charities: 1 in 12
live in poverty: 1 in 8
p. 277 Moving from owing to owning (again, title says it all)
At this point you may be saying, I'm tired of reading this (I can't believe you made it this far) but more likely you're saying "listen, every book has problems, what are solutions?"
Well Chapter 15 is made for you, he literally breaks down how we can solve these problems.
Listen, obviously this wasn't the best book report ever but the book is so broad, and yet so detailed, its almost impossible to summarize accurately. Just pick it up, download it, borrow or rent it, do whatever you have to. It's informative, enlightening, depressing and inspiring. Give it a shot! If nothing else, it's better than "Twilight"
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1 comments:
Upon reading this post, I'm thinking you should have been a sociology major in school!
The arguments this book presents, and the way in which it presents them, is fundamentally sociological in nature.
Perhaps you should consider pursuing graduate school in sociology...you could do research, teach at the collegiate level or be a social advocate!
I'm serious, it would be ballin
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