OTM: Poverty Tour

The very poor in our country are the poorest they've ever been. How is that possible? Isn't America the land of opportunity? Sadly, it used to be. But now that thought has simply turned in to a delusion.

Many of us scored on the family we were born in to. Middle class is a good place to be and it is comfortable. Poverty is something that most of us will never understand or experience. Factors of poverty include: race, proximity, and gender.  Research says that in Salt Lake City, you have an 11% chance to rise from the bottom fifth income bracket to the top fifth. On the opposite side, you have a 4% chance, which is basically no chance at all.

In the Appalachian areas, there has always been problems with poverty. Beginning at the turn of the century, there were always more people than jobs. People in this area are living in rusted trailers and wooden shacks. Some have electricity but many do not have running water. Multiple families are living in these shacks. This kind of poverty is hard to see because it's not easily seen. You have to drive through back roads to witness it. It's hard to get the media to cover it and it's even harder to understand.

The biggest misconception about poor people is that they are poor. In some cases, this is true. But in many, this is not the problem.We have created this idea in our country, that if we help them or share with them, it is only hurting them. We have this idea that if we help them it is creating some kind of dependency. Many American citizens don't believe that poverty is an issue in our country. In result of that, it keeps getting neglected and over looked.

I'm not going to lie, this podcast was a little hard for me to relate to. In Utah, our poverty is not nearly as bad as other places around the country. I don't have any kind of clue what it is to live like that. I was blessed to be born in to the family that I was. Not by any means are we rich, but we are comfortable. It is time for the upper middle class and wealthy to take action and understand these issues and the crisis that poverty is.