Are the wealthy just born in the right place at the right time? Or are the poor victims of the system designed to keep them down. Perhaps physics and biology determine who is rich and who is poor? Many hoped to have erased the divide between the haves and the have nots, but what if Nature demands winners and losers in life? Could poverty be genetic? Morgan Freeman’s Through the Wormhole s5e9: Is Poverty Genetic? Science 2014
Dispatches reveals the startling emergence of baby banks … More than 100 baby banks have now appeared across the UK. Dispatches: Born on the Breadline, Channel 4 2018
Splitting up, losing a job or paying for a funeral – just some of the things that mean families can struggle to afford life’s essentials: food, warmth and a place to call home. Dispatches: Growing Up Poor: Britain’s Breadline Kids, Channel 4 2019
These children speak for more than four million kids growing up in poverty. ibid.
2,000 food banks that have been set up in the UK in the last decade. ibid.
A third of the American workforce earn less than $12 an hour and most of them do not have access to employer-sponsored health insurance. Chris Hedges, lecture Sanctuary for Independent Media, New York 2018, ‘American Anomie’, Youtube 2.01.07
An aggressive criminalisation of the poor … The poor are thrown into prison and must forfeit all their property for being caught with small amounts of the same drugs. ibid.
Employment in the UK is at a record high. Yet a third of people in work have less than £500 savings. Broke s1e1, BBC 2019
Last year local radio stations up and down the country played adverts asking people to phone in if they were struggling to make ends meet despite having a job. Calls came in from all over the UK. ibid.
We followed nine families for a year as their financial futures hung in the balance. Being broke is not the same as being broken. ibid.
They’ve [father and son] been living in a couple of flimsy tents and recently moved into the woods at the back of a friend’s house. But winter is coming. ibid.
Britain is one of the richest countries in the world yet millions of people still struggle to pay the bills. ibid.
Employment in the UK is at a record high. But almost a million workers are on zero hours contracts with no formal job security. Broke s1e2
‘I’m just another player in the gig economy. And mouth to mouth month to month.’ ibid. dude
Food banks: that number has risen to over 1.5 million. ibid.
For generations governments have sought to simplify the benefits system. The latest attempt, universal credit – merging six benefits into one – was supposed make life better for claimants, many of them vulnerable, the least able to manage. Panorama: Universal Credit: One Year On, BBC 2019
Some seven million households are expected to be claiming. ibid.
‘People are struggling. Costs are going through the roof. And I’m not sure there’s any way of stopping it.’ Panorama: Surviving the Pay Squeeze, BBC 2023
Millions of Britons have effectively had a pay cut. Wages aren’t keeping up with costs. Public services are struggling too. ibid.
Why do so many people feel so poor? ibid.
Some of our problems are specific to the UK. ibid.
Universal credit is the biggest overhaul of the welfare state in a generation. It’s designed to simplify the benefits system and encourage the unemployed into work. But it’s controversial. Universal Credit: Inside the Welfare State I, BBC 2020
In the UK, 7 million working-age people receive some kind of state benefit. Since the 1960s benefits have grown into a complex system of claims. ibid.
‘All the time we’re here [welfare office] we’re under the threat of sanctions.’ ibid. claimant
We follow the people designing the new system, the claimants living on it, and the staff in the Job Centres keeping everything on track … Toxteth Job Centre, Liverpool: more than 45,000 people on Universal Credit. Universal Credit: Inside the Welfare State II
‘How long do I need to be doing this job-search thing? It’s stressful.’ ibid. middle-aged lady to case manager
In Toxteth Gemma manages a team of 41 life coaches who each have between 150-200 claimants on their caseload. ibid.
From the end of 2018 anybody whose circumstances have changed need to move from the old system on to Universal Credit. For many there can be a gap of up to five weeks between applying and their first payment. Universal Credit: Inside the Welfare State III
For young people entering work for the first time low wages and zero-hours contracts have become the standard. ibid.
When Universal Credit was announced in 2011 it was widely supported by all main political parties. Since it began rolling out, the new benefit has been heavily criticised. ibid.
Poor kids are just as bright and just as talented as white kids. Joe Biden, Iowa, August 8th, cited The Federalist online
So educated Europeans today know how children die when the whip of debt and bombs whistle over poor countries. It is not knowledge that is lacking … Imperialism is a biologically necessary process that according to the laws of nature leads to the inevitable destruction of the lower races. Exterminate All the Brutes IV: The Bright Colours of Fascism, HBO 2021
To recommend thrift to the poor is both grotesque and insulting. It is like advising a man who is starving to eat less. Oscar Wilde, The Soul of Man Under Socialism
The poor are only poor because they spend so much of their income on Guinness. Peaky Blinders s6e3, Mitford, BBC 2022
We were told four years ago that 17 million people went to bed hungry every night. Well, that was probably true. They were all on a diet. Ronald Reagan, TV speech 27th October 1964
San Diego: Next to a parkway in this parking lot 54-year-old Maria begins her day. This car is her home. Maria no longer has a place to live. She’s been sleeping in her van for a year now. Just like Maria, around 30 other people sleep overnight in their car in this free parking lot. Poverty in the USA: Being Poor in the World’s Richest Country, Endevr films 2022
In the United States 40 million people are living below the poverty line. ibid.
The system is not very kind to those short of cash. ibid.
In the state of Virginia the law is strict: if the rent is late by five days the landlord has the right to begin the eviction process. ibid.
Richmond: Budget hotels on the outskirts of the city have become a refuge for those kicked out of their homes. ibid.
28 million Americans still do not have any health insurance. ibid.