13 | April | 2013 | Impressions

“Family in Need. Due Lay off. Any help Appreciated. Thank you God Bless.” (Photo: T.V. Antony Raj)

The United States can be a cold, inhospitable, and cruel country for the poor, where mercy and compassion are not particularly evident.

Poverty continues to grow each year, and the middle class continues to shrink as unemployment stays high. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, in 2011, due to rising living costs, nearly half the Americans have fallen into poverty or are scraping by on earnings that classify them as low income. In other words, more than 146 million Americans are categorized as poor or have a low income, and this does not include those classified in the “near poverty” category. These figures follow years of stagnating wages for the middle class that has hurt millions of workers and families.

Though the federal government claims that the recession is over and things are getting better, the number of layoffs last month in the United States was 30 percent higher than a year ago. What the poor in this country really need are jobs.

Poverty has driven thousands of people out of their homes and has transformed them in to mole people, living under major U.S. cities – in abandoned subways, railroads, flood and sewage tunnels and heating shafts. They are also called “tunnel people” or “tunnel dwellers”. Mole people are found in New York City, Las Vegas and even in Kansas City, Missouri.

Besides the thousands of mole people living under the major U.S. cities, there are thousands living in tent cities, thousands that living in vehicles. It is pathetic to know that more than a million public school children do not have a home to go back to at night.