Middle-Class Homelessness in America
Name Xxxxx
Professor First and Lastname
ENGL - Exploratory Essay
17, May 2013
Middle-class Homelessness in America Will there be room at the Inn for middle- class Americans? Can you imagine yourself standing in line in hope for a cot at a shelter to share with your family, or waiting for a warm meal in a soup kitchen? This is what many middle-class American citizens have succumbed to. Has the American dream been lost, has the middle-class lost its position in the American economy, and has the inequality of income cause the demise of the middle-class? By focusing on the health care reform and record low unemployment rate we overlook the underlying problem; the dwindling middle-class, the backbone of our country. Many studies have been conducted to define middle-class without much success. It has been attempted to relate it to annual income. One study states that yearly incomes between $32,900 and $64,000, another between $50,800 and $122,000, and the U.S. census bureau middle 60% of incomes is the largest range of all lies between$ 20600, and $102,000 as what defines middle-class. Dan Horn notes in the Cincinnati Enquirer “Psychologist Ken Eisold, a contributor to Psychology today, said, though, that the way people describe their social status has more to do with what’s going on in their heads than their wallets.” Eisold goes on to say that “it’s really more about identity”. Horn adds that Julie Heath, director of the University of Cincinnati’s Economics Center agrees with Eisold that saying, “We’re a middle-class family has more than a financial connotations to it, it has a salt-of the earth to it. That’s the bed rock.” Essentially this shows that Americans do not base their social status on their income alone, but also on their personal accomplishments and views of where they have come from and where they are going. That being said, the bed rock of the middle-class comes from one of the most common descriptions what living in America is all
Professor First and Lastname
ENGL - Exploratory Essay
17, May 2013
Middle-class Homelessness in America Will there be room at the Inn for middle- class Americans? Can you imagine yourself standing in line in hope for a cot at a shelter to share with your family, or waiting for a warm meal in a soup kitchen? This is what many middle-class American citizens have succumbed to. Has the American dream been lost, has the middle-class lost its position in the American economy, and has the inequality of income cause the demise of the middle-class? By focusing on the health care reform and record low unemployment rate we overlook the underlying problem; the dwindling middle-class, the backbone of our country. Many studies have been conducted to define middle-class without much success. It has been attempted to relate it to annual income. One study states that yearly incomes between $32,900 and $64,000, another between $50,800 and $122,000, and the U.S. census bureau middle 60% of incomes is the largest range of all lies between$ 20600, and $102,000 as what defines middle-class. Dan Horn notes in the Cincinnati Enquirer “Psychologist Ken Eisold, a contributor to Psychology today, said, though, that the way people describe their social status has more to do with what’s going on in their heads than their wallets.” Eisold goes on to say that “it’s really more about identity”. Horn adds that Julie Heath, director of the University of Cincinnati’s Economics Center agrees with Eisold that saying, “We’re a middle-class family has more than a financial connotations to it, it has a salt-of the earth to it. That’s the bed rock.” Essentially this shows that Americans do not base their social status on their income alone, but also on their personal accomplishments and views of where they have come from and where they are going. That being said, the bed rock of the middle-class comes from one of the most common descriptions what living in America is all